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Welsh Memorial Park, Ypres

National symbols of WalesSculptures of dragonsWorld War I memorials in BelgiumYpres Salient
Welsh Memorial Park Ypres 001
Welsh Memorial Park Ypres 001

The Welsh National Memorial Park is a war memorial in Langemark near Ypres (Belgium) for soldiers of World War I, located near the Pilkem Ridge in the former Ypres Salient. It commemorates the service of men and women of Welsh origin, wherever they served during the Great War as part of the Allied Powers, as well as the non-Welsh soldiers serving in Welsh formations.

Excerpt from the Wikipedia article Welsh Memorial Park, Ypres (License: CC BY-SA 3.0, Authors, Images).

Welsh Memorial Park, Ypres
Boezingestraat,

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N 50.9029 ° E 2.9001 °
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Welsh National Memorial Park

Boezingestraat
8920
West Flanders, Belgium
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Welsh Memorial Park Ypres 001
Welsh Memorial Park Ypres 001
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Langemark
Langemark

Langemark is a village in the Belgian province of West Flanders, and a subdivision of the municipality of Langemark-Poelkapelle. The village has about 5,000 inhabitants. Besides the village center, there are also three smaller hamlets on the territory, Madonna, Bikschote and Saint-Julien/Sint-Juliaan. Written as Langemarck on French, British and German maps, the village is known in military history as the scene (see trench map) of the first gas attacks by the German army in the western front, which marked the beginning of the Second Battle of Ypres in April 1915. Before and during the First Battle of Ypres, the German reserve corps suffered enormous losses: over 10,000 young soldiers (some only 15 years old), led by young officers without practical experience, died without achieving any objective. On 10 November 1914, about 2,000 soldiers died during an attempted breakthrough. One day later, the German Command (Oberste Heeresleitung) published the following communiqué: Westlich Langemarck brachen junge Regimenter unter dem Gesange‚ Deutschland, Deutschland über alles‘ gegen die erste Linie der feindlichen Stellungen vor und nahmen sie. Etwa 2.000 Mann französischer Linieninfanterie wurden gefangengenommen und sechs Maschinengewehre erbeutet.In west Langemarck, youth regiments singing Germany, Germany Above All advanced on front line enemy positions, broke and took them. Approximately 2,000 French line infantry and six machine guns were captured.A popular and enduring myth of heroic self-sacrifice for the nation known as the "Mythos von Langemarck" arose from the propagandistic story. For this reason, the Flemish division of the Waffen-SS was named 27th SS Volunteer Division Langemarck. The village was destroyed during World War I. There is now a major German war cemetery, the Langemark German war cemetery, (Soldatenfriedhof) in this location, which has about 40,000 burials.

Battle of Pilckem Ridge
Battle of Pilckem Ridge

The Battle of Pilckem Ridge (31 July – 2 August 1917) was the opening attack of the Third Battle of Ypres in the First World War. The British Fifth Army, supported by the Second Army on the southern flank and the French 1reArmée (First Army) on the northern flank, attacked the German 4th Army, which defended the Western Front from Lille northwards to the Ypres Salient in Belgium and on to the North Sea coast. On 31 July, the Anglo-French armies captured Pilckem (Flemish: Pilkem) Ridge and areas on either side, the French attack being a great success. After several weeks of changeable weather, heavy rain fell during the afternoon of 31 July. In the XIX Corps area in the centre and on the right of XVIII Corps, three reserve brigades advanced from the black line to the main objective (green line) and pressed on towards the red line, the furthest that exploitation on local initiative had been allowed for in the plan. It began to rain, cutting off the advanced British troops from view, just as German regiments from specialist Eingreif (counter-attack) divisions advanced over Passchendaele Ridge. To avoid being rolled up, the reserve brigades retreated, suffering many casualties, through the green line to the black line, which the British artillery-observers could still see; the German infantry were prevented from advancing further by massed artillery and small-arms fire. A substantial amount of ground had been captured by the British and French, except on the Gheluvelt Plateau on the right flank, where only the blue line (first objective) and part of the black line (second objective) were captured. A large number of casualties were inflicted on the German defenders during the attack and 5,626 prisoners were taken; the German Eingreif divisions recaptured some ground from the Ypres–Roulers railway northwards to St Julien, forcing the British back to the black line. For the next few days, both sides made local attacks to improve their positions, much hampered by the deluges. The rains had a serious effect on operations in August, causing more problems for the British and French, who were advancing into the area devastated by artillery fire and partly flooded by the unseasonable rain. A local British attack on the Gheluvelt Plateau on 2 August was postponed several times because of the weather until 10 August and the second big general attack, due on 4 August, did not begin until 16 August. The green line objectives on the Plateau were not captured until the Battle of the Menin Road Ridge on 20 September, after the principal role in the offensive was transferred to the Second Army and three weeks' sunshine and fresh breezes dried much of the ground. The Third Battle of Ypres became controversial while it was being fought, with disputes about the predictability of the August deluges and for its mixed results, which in much of the writing in English is blamed on apparent misunderstandings between Gough and Haig and on faulty planning, rather than on the resilience of the 4th Army.

Langemark German war cemetery
Langemark German war cemetery

The German war cemetery of Langemark (formerly spelt 'Langemarck') is near the village of Langemark, part of the municipality of Langemark-Poelkapelle, in the Belgian province of West Flanders. More than 44,000 soldiers are buried here. The village was the scene of the first gas attacks by the German army in the western front (see trench map), marking the beginning of the Second Battle of Ypres in April 1915. During the First Battle of Ypres (1914) in World War I, inexperienced German infantry suffered severe casualties when they made a futile frontal attack on allied positions near Langemark and were checked by experienced French infantry and British riflemen. Contrary to popular myth, only fifteen percent of the German soldiers involved in the Battle of Langemark were schoolboys and students. Legend has it that the German infantry sang the first stanza of what later (1919) became their national anthem "Deutschland, Deutschland über alles", as they charged. The cemetery, which evolved from a small group of graves from 1915, has seen numerous changes and extensions. It was dedicated in 1932. Today, visitors find a mass grave near the entrance. This comrades' grave contains 24,917 servicemen, including the Ace Werner Voss. Between the oak trees, next to this mass grave, are another 10,143 soldiers (including 2 British soldiers killed in 1918). The 3,000 school students who were killed during the First Battle of Ypres are buried in a third part of the cemetery. At the front of the cemetery is a sculpture of four mourning figures by Professor Emil Krieger. The group was added in 1956, and is said to stand guard over the fallen. The cemetery is maintained by the German War Graves Commission, the Volksbund Deutsche Kriegsgräberfürsorge. Otherwise, this cemetery has two Commonwealth burials.

Battle of Broodseinde
Battle of Broodseinde

The Battle of Broodseinde was fought on 4 October 1917 near Ypres in Belgium, at the east end of the Gheluvelt plateau, by the British Second and Fifth armies against the German 4th Army. The battle was the most successful Allied attack of the Third Battle of Ypres. Using bite-and-hold tactics, with objectives limited to what could be held against German counter-attacks, the British devastated the German defence, which prompted a crisis among the German commanders and caused a severe loss of morale in the 4th Army. Preparations were made by the Germans for local withdrawals and planning began for a greater withdrawal, which would entail the abandonment by the Germans of the Belgian coast, one of the strategic aims of the Flanders offensive. After the period of unsettled but drier weather in September, heavy rain began again on 4 October and affected the remainder of the campaign, working more to the advantage of the German defenders, being pushed back on to far less damaged ground. The British had to move their artillery forward into the area devastated by shellfire and soaked by the autumn rains, restricting the routes on which guns and ammunition could be moved, presenting German artillery with easier targets. At the Battle of Poelcappelle on 9 October, after several more days of rain, the German defence achieved a costly success, holding the approaches to Passchendaele village, the most tactically vital ground on the battlefield.