Current Information:

49, Sebright Road, Barnet

Tyne Cot Cemetery, Belgium

Third Battle of Ypres

This was a campaign fought between July and November 1917 and is often referred to as the Battle of Passchendaele, a village to the north-east of Ypres which was finally captured in November. It was an attempt by the British to break out of the Ypres salient and capture the higher ground to the south and the east from which the enemy had been able to dominate the salient. It began well but two important factors weighed against them. First was the weather. The summer of 1917 turned out to be one of the the wettest on record and soon the battlefield was reduced to a morass of mud which made progress very difficult, if not impossible in places. The second was the defensive arrangements of concrete blockhouses and machine gun posts providing inter-locking fire that the Germans had constructed and which were extremely difficult and costly to counter. For 4 months this epic struggle continued by the end of which the salient had been greatly expanded in size but the vital break out had not been achieved.

The Battle of Langemarck

This took place between 16th-18th August, 1917 and was the second general attack of 3rd Ypres. Although it did not rain during the two days of the battle itself there had been plenty of it in the preceding days and in many places the battlefield was a quagmire. On the left of the attack in the north-west of the Ypres salient there was considerable success,  especially for the French Army which attacked on the left of the British, but the attack on the Gheluvelt Plateau, due east of Ypres, met determined German resistance and the early gains were soon reversed.

On 16th August, 56th Division attacked at 4.45am on the right of the battle front, with 169 and 167 Brigades. They also had the 7th Bedfordshire battalion from 54 Brigade, 18th Division and the 4th London battalion from 168 Brigade attached to form a southern defensive flank. From the start these two battalions were hit by heavy shell fire from Zandvoorde which caused delays and many casualties. Those who were able to continued moving forward until they were stopped by heavy machine-gun fire from Inverness Copse notably from a pillbox in the north-west corner which had not been put out of action by the preliminary bombardment. 7th Bedfordshire were stopped completely by fire from this pillbox but 4th London eventually established a defensive flank along the southern edge of Glencorse Wood. There were many casualties among the two battalions, one of whom was George Anthistle of 7th Bedfordshire.