Current Information:

Born-Rotherhithe

Royal Irish Graveyard, Laventie, France

The Battle of La Bassée

This was fought by II Corps (3rd and 5th Divisions) between 10th October and 2nd November 1914 and as the name suggests it focused on an area around the town of La Bassée in northern France. It was part of the Race to the Sea and it determined the line of the Western Front in that sector. There were some initial British successes but La Bassée remained firmly in German hands. German reinforcements arrived and the village of Neuve Chapelle was captured by them. Towards the end of October, the fighting on this front died down as the attention of both armies switched to Ypres.

At the beginning of the war in August 1914, the 1st Connaught Rangers battalion were in India as part of the Ferozepore Brigade, Lahore Division of the Indian Army which almost immediately set sail for Europe, landing at Marseilles on 26th September. From here they moved north in time to add their weight to the fighting at La Bassée. On 1st November the battalion moved into support trenches at Rue du Bacquerot, near Laventie and on the following day, 2nd November, moved forward to support the 2nd Gurkhas who were retiring in the face of a strong enemy attack. Other units were called upon as well but their combined efforts were not enough to recover the lost positions and by the end of the day the British line had fallen back to new positions. At midnight on 4/5th November, there was an attempt by some of 1st Connaught Rangers to recover some of the lost trenches but there were too few of them to make it succeed and at a critical stage of the operation many of the rifle bolts jammed. James Connolly was killed on 5th November.