Page 7 - Walking Back Through Time

PREFACE
THE GREAT WAR - Ypres to Amiens Day 1 - 5km Tour of Ypres
Arriving at the Menin Gate is a memorable occasion in itself and having set up camp nearby, I am able to attend the last post ceremony which is conducted each night before dusk. It is a poignant affair commemorat- ing so many lives lost in a battle for freedom, and the names inscribed inside this huge monument represent the 90,000 men of Britain and the Commonwealth with no known grave having died in the Ypres Salient during 4 years of war. The Menin Gate Memorial, unveiled in 1927 was built to ensure the human sacrifice of history’s most horrific war should never be forgotten; it was to those who survived Flanders Fields, the most sacred place on Earth.
By the end of the first year of conflict an elaborate network of trenches stretched from the North Sea to the Swiss border near Basel. These primitive dug outs had no infrastructures and gave little protection for the allied soldiers in winter inflicting bouts of trench foot sometimes leading to amputation. Food was barely nourishing and the men relied heavily on packages delivered from home so as to make life on the frontline more bearable.
LIFE ON THE FRONTLINE
POEM - 'The Tommie’
A "Tommie's" life is but a candle in a storm,
It flickers like a moth at night and may only live till dawn. Fate lies fifty yards away in a path of coiled wire,
He may be lucky this time and dodge the rapid fire.
But the cycle of warfare brings little respite,
As a counter-offensive prolongs his fight.
Now with broken spirit, tiredness and despair, Comes the inevitable stalemate of trench warfare.