Ypres
GOOGLE MAPS Link centres on Ypres
Ypres is a town in Belgium. Historically it had prospered from the wool trade. Strategically the town’s location controlled the route to the Channel Coast and was an important railhead. The British occupied the town and it was the main entrance into the Ypres Salient. Fighting at Ypres was almost continual through the war with a succession of offensives by the British and Germans – First Ypres, 1914, Second Ypres, 1915, Third Ypres 1917 and, in 1918, the Advance in Flanders and the end of the war.
Ypres Salient.
By the end of November 1914 the mobile war was over and the stalemate of the trenches had arrived. The lines of defences would become ‘The Western Front’, stretching from the Belgium coast to the Alps in Switzerland. At Ypres the line of trenches looped around the town forming a salient. The British held the town and the neighbouring lower ground. The Germans held the encircling heights and ridges – Messines, Passchendaele and (Pilkem) – which would be the battlegrounds for the later Second and Third Battles of Ypres. The superior German positions gave them control over the entire ‘loop’ and they could bombard the British positions from the north, east and south. The ‘Ypres Salient’ soon gained a deserved evil reputation amongst the troops. There would be a steady, bloody drain of casualties and over the course of the war many Oswestrians would fall in the Ypres Salient
1914
1915
February
(Place N/k) 3 Bn Middlesex Regiment. 7-10 February 1915.
March/April
St Eloi. 2 Bn King’s Shropshire Light Infantry. March 1915.
Polygon Wood. 2Bn King’s Shropshire Light Infantry. April 1915.
April/May
Second Ypres 22 April – 25 May 1915
June
Zillebeke. Gordon House. 5 Bn King’s Shropshire Light Infantry. June 1915
July
Potijze & Wieltje.
Wieltje. 3 Bn Rifle Brigade. July 1915
Kemmel & La Clytte.
Kemmel & La Clytte. 2 Bn East Yorkshire. Regiment. 14 July 1915
August
Hooge Crater, Menin Road.
Hooge Crater. 1 Bn King’s Shropshire Light Infantry. 1-10 August 1915
Hooge Crater. 5 Bn King’s Shropshire Light Infantry. 1-10 August 1915
September
Battle of Loos – Diversionary action at Railway Wood, Ypres. 25 September 1915.
5 Bn King’s Shropshire Light Infantry – diversionary action at (Railway Wood, Ypres). 25 Sept 1915.
December
la Brique – 1 Bn King’s Shropshire Light Infantry. 17 – 20 December 1915.
1916
January – February
Ypres. Elveringhe. 5 Bn King’s Shropshire Light Infantry. January – February 1916.
March
La Belle Alliance.
Ypres. La Belle Alliance. 6 Bn King’s Shropshire Light Infantry. February – April 1916.
Hooge, Halfway House. 2 Bn Canadian Mounted Rifles. March 1916
April
Ypres. La Belle Alliance. 6 Bn King’s Shropshire Light Infantry. February – April 1916.
St Eloi. The Mound. 7 Bn King’s Shropshire Light Infantry. 1 April 1916.
May
Ridge Wood and Bois Carre – St. Eloi. 7 Bn King’s Shropshire Light Infantry. May 1916. (2 MotG)
St. Eloi. 12 Bn West Yorkshire Regiment (Prince of Wales’s Own). 4 May 1916.
Peselhoek. . 11 Bn Leicestershire Regiment (Pioneers). 13 May 1916.
July
Ypres Salient. 6 Bn King’s Shropshire Light Infantry. July 1916
September
Ypres Salient. 1 Bn East Lancashire Regiment. 3 September 1916.
1917
February 1917.
March – April 1917.
May
Ypres town. 94 Field Coy Royal Engineers. 3 May 1917
July 1917
1918
Advance in Flanders
100 Days – 8 August 1918 – 11 November 1918.
B&O ALL YEARS. Ypres
END