Where is passchendaele ridge

Although telegraph poles now run alongside it, in other respects the memorial and the setting are very little changed from a view taken between the wars see below.

The front panel has a longer inscription: it is now very faded and difficult to read but it lists the units which made up the 7th Division in including the 20th, 21st and 22nd Infantry Brigades. A much less weathered inscription on the rear gives the makeup of the Division in , when the 21st Infantry Brigade had been replaced by the 91st.

The Divisions battle honours are inscribed on the sides of the obelisk that surmounts the memorial. The battle honours include First Ypres, the battle of Neuve Chapelle in , a number of battles on the Somme in and of course Broodseinde in For , the battle honours reflect the Divisions move late in to Italy.

The battle of Broodseinde commenced on the 4th of October , when the 7th Division units attacked at 6 a. Over five days they suffered over 2, casualties.

The Division also fought here in At the roundabout in Broodseinde, the N meets the N, and turning right towards Ypres leads to Zonnebeke. Located here is the Passendale Memorial Museum , on the left just after you pass the church in Zonnebeke at the roundabout. The entrance to the museum is shown below, and in front of this on either side are set the remains of pillboxes.

The entrance leads into a park area. This is actually the grounds of the old chateau, previously owned by the Iweins family — shown in the picture above. In , the estate was sold to the town, and it then became a park.

The museum itself is actually in the old chateau. The original building was destroyed in the War, but the chateau was rebuilt in The museum opened in , on Anzac Day. Inside are audio-visual and interactive exhibits, giving the history of the Ypres salient, and of the Battle of Passchendaele. There are also many exhibits of equipment, armaments and personal effects. There is also a flammenwerfer or flame-thrower , as first used not far from here at Hooge.

Another display is of various types of body armour, including the steel plate that the Germans wore fitted over two bolts on either side of their helmets to protect them from bullets. The displays are arranged more or less chronologically covering the War, and include soldiers personal items, such as an intact bottle of olives.

There is a large modern aerial photograph of the Salient in one room, which is located horizontally in the centre of the room, and on this are marked many sites, such as cemeteries, memorials and bunkers. There is also a series of scale models of different bunkers from the salient, and information on their use in the Great War.

The centrepiece is a recreation of a substantial British dugout. This is entered down steep narrow steps, and once within the dug-out the ceilings are low and there are duckboards on the floor.

The dugout is lit by dim, flickering electrical lights, and there are appropriate sound effects; always in the background the dull rumble of the guns.

In one room is the sound of sawing; in another the monotonous thump of a pump, which would have been needed often in the salient to keep the dugout even reasonably dry. Rooms lead off the main corridor, and include a bunkroom, an office and a dressing station complete with a gruesomely injured soldier, and a chaplain probably reading the last rites.

The re-creation is very well done, and the day I visited was quiet; the effect was atmospheric and claustrophobic, almost uncomfortable after a while.

Yet men lived in such conditions and not as clean or safe as this one and it became almost the norm. Just beyond the bunker is a room with an interactive screen with a map showing green dots marking the location of bunkers or dugouts in the salient.

Fifteen are larger red dots, and if you touch these they show information on the excavation of these sites. The earliest one, Birr cross-roads in Zillebeke, was excavated in , and there are photographs of the excavation. Later ones often have a number of short videos, as well as photos, plans and information on the bunker. One photograph of a bunkroom at the Beecham site near Passchendaele can be compared with the bunkroom in the museum recreation, and shows what an accurate job has been done here.

Around the room are displays of finds from some of these sites; duckboards, ladders, weapons, shovels, clothing and personal effects. On the outside is a plaque dedicated to the D21 Battery of Canadian Field Artillery, which was based in the ruins of the church during Third Ypres. You must be logged in to post a comment. Passchedaele locations map. Passchendaele Church. Stained glass windows in Passchedaele Church.

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Thanks for contributing to The Canadian Encyclopedia. Article by R. Roy , Richard Foot. A Canadian soldier walks across the blasted, mud-soaked Passchendaele battlefield during the First World War in Map showing progress in the Ypres area, 1 Aug to 17 Nov, GSGS War Office.

Previous Next. Soldiers carry a wounded Canadian to an aid-post during the Battle of Passchendaele, November Two wounded First World War soldiers - a Canadian and a German - light cigarettes on the muddy Passchendaele battlefield in Belgium in Canadian soldiers wounded during the Battle of Passchendaele, November, Laying trench mats over the mud during the Battle of Passchendaele, in Belgium, November, The graves of unknown Canadian soldiers who fought and died at the Battle of Passchendaele.

These men were later buried nearby at the cemetary at Tyne Cot, Belgium. A detail of the Menin Gate memorial in Ypres Ieper Belgium, which is inscribed with the names of the 6, Canadians who died in Belgium during the First World War with no known graves. Mont Sorrel Somme Vimy Ridge Hill 70 Amiens Further Reading D. Battle of Passchendaele Third Battle of Ypres. Passchendaele now Passendale , West Flanders, Belgium. But by 2 August the rain had made any kind of strategic movement all but impossible.

As a result, the whole Passchendaele offensive was postponed for several days. This painting by Lieutenant Richard Talbot Kelly shows the difficulties artillery crews had in getting ammunition to their guns due to the rain. Talbot Kelly himself was wounded on 5 August A shell exploded nearby and, while he suffered internal injuries, he survived. He wrote afterwards in his memoirs: 'One does not hear the shell that gets one. If the ground had not been a bog and as soft as it was it is absolutely certain that I would have been blown to bits.

Renewed effort was made in new battles. At Langemarck August , the French once again made substantial gains and the British were also able to take some ground, but German counter-attacks forced them back. Rain once again hindered any attempts at attack. And morale among the German defenders remained higher than the British generals expected. With the British Army's earlier attempts to break through on a wide front having been halted by the deep German defence system, Plumer instead selected for attack a small part of the German front line.

This would be heavily shelled and then assaulted in strength. The advancing troops would stop once they had penetrated 1, yards into the German lines. At this point they would dig in, and another wave of attacking troops would pass through them to attack the next objective. The original attackers would then consolidate the ground they had taken, and become the new reserve for future advances.

Using this tactic became possible when more artillery was deployed, thanks partly to the ground drying out between late August and September. It meant that British soldiers did not move beyond where they could be supported. In addition, they were aided by more and better aircraft carrying out air defence, artillery observation and ground-attack sorties. This meant that when the German counter-attack was launched, instead of finding a mass of exhausted and disorganised men at the limit of the Allied advance, they would find a well organised defensive line still in range of supporting artillery.

The Menin Road operation was a success. German counter-attacks were repulsed on the first and second days of the operation. Three quiet days then followed. The battle ended with a final German counter-attack on 25 September, again repulsed without serious problems.

The allied forces made two further successful attacks in September and October at Polygon Wood and Broodseinde and drove the Germans back to the top of Passchendaele ridge. Australian soldiers were used from September to try and regain the momentum, making the most of better weather to help carry the advance. But the weather turned again, and they too struggled. At the outbreak of the war, he attempted to join the army to return to Europe and fight. It took five attempts before he was accepted.

He survived the battle, but his health collapsed and he was invalided from service in October In mid-October, with the battle bogging down due to British and Australian exhaustion, the stubborn German defence and the bad weather, Haig sent for the Canadians to make a final push and try to salvage a victory. Passchendaele ridge was finally captured on 10 November.

Currie estimated that throwing the Canadians into battle at Passchendaele would result in 16, casualties. He was eerily accurate: 15, Canadians were killed or wounded. The British suffered , casualties fighting for Passchendaele, and inflicted around , on the Germans. The British had taken the high ground around Ypres and advanced five miles. But was the return worth it?