The Ypres Times. 89 few years ago were veritable rubbish heaps, are now overgrown with grass, plants, shrubs and the Somme can even rival Flanders for poppy-fields. Looking on scenes to-day of peaceful villages, smiling green fields, and verdant woods, it is difficult to realize that only a few years back raged tremendous battles, terrific bombardments by shell, and these same places witnessed the lumbering of tanks in action, the traction of huge calibre guns by caterpillars," the passing of Armies and the whirr of giant aeroplanes. Then occa sionally one passes a multitude of black wooden crosses, enclosed by a wallthese are the graves of German soldiers who fell on the Somme. In fact, the Valley of the Somme seems to be a world of the Dead English, French, and German. The British military cemeteries every where brought into relief by the tall Cross of Remembrance, are wonderfully arranged and models of neatness. The headstones, which in a number of cemeteries have taken the place of wooden crosses, are inscribed these are the graves of gerhan soediers."j with the rank, name and regiment of the fallenthe regimental badge filling, more or less, the centre of the stone, with the exception of the grave of an unknown warrior," in which case there is simply an inscription "A Soldier of the Great War," followed under neath by Known unto God." A printed Register of Graves can usually be found in each cemetery in which are set out full particulars of the Fallen buried there, with exact location of each grave. Beautiful flowers adorn the graves, and in some cases I cannot conceive more peaceful surroundings. Whilst visiting one cemetery near Corbie on the Somme, I heard sounds of weeping, and turning round caught sight of a pathetic figure prostrated before one of the graves. The old soul, who had travelled all the way from Scotland, had completely broken down, and a paroxysm of sobbing followed, which would have melted even the hardest of hearts. All I could do was to look on in dismay, whilst the birds twittered merrily overhead in the bright sunshine, wondering perhaps, why all the quaint old world was not twittering as well. After a time, the old lady recovereda woman of sorrow, a picture of lonelinessand then stood by the headstone whilst a photograph was being taken. As I gazed on her wrinkled, yet beautiful face, down which tears trickled like rain-drops on her son's grave, I could not help realizing how terribly the mothers of England must have suffered during the war, not only by day, but in the long reaches of the night, when fears and torment of mind prevented sleep. Your mother does not cease to think of you for a single moment," is a pathetic message on the headstone of the grave of a Lieutenant of the 7th London Regiment. Alas there are thousands of such inscriptions which speak for themselves. The Scottish widow had lost two sons in the warone killed at Arras and the other drowned in the Somme. Her husband died last year, but despite her triple loss, she bore her burden bravely. "I'm satisfied noo," she said to me, with deep emotion, casting a farewell glance at her son's last resting place, I can go back hame to bonny Scotland feeling different, feeling better theyT could not have done more for my wee laddie." I shall never forget that simple, dear old Scottish widow. In the car that same day was a man who had lost his brother, a mother her son, a girl her brother, and a woman who had lost her husband. A few days later, I left Amiens again by car, this time with Captain Oswald, and we

HISTORISCHE KRANTEN

The Ypres Times (1921-1936) | 1926 | | pagina 7