Current Information:

Age-19

17, Warham Road, Harringay

Chester Farm 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.

After their involvement in the successful Battle of Broodseinde on 4th October, 1917, 4th Middlesex of 63 Brigade, 37th Division, moved back to a camp near Halleblast Corner and remained out of the firing line until 10th October. On that date they moved to Shrapnel Corner east of Ypres, marched to Canada Tunnels near the Menin Road and were then guided to the front line just south of Veldhoek which they were to hold during the First Battle of Passchendaele, which began two days later. The journey up to the front line was not without loss. The German guns were hard at it, particularly near Mount Sorrel, and eight officers and men from 4th Middlesex were killed and another five wounded. One of those killed was Ernest Swallow.