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Posted on October 4th 2023
HASN Goes Forth
Year 9 were up bright and early on Tuesday morning to take the coach to Flanders Fields to for themselves the remnants of the Western Front of the First World War which they studied in Year 9. Despite a painfully early start, by the time we arrived on the outskirts of Ypres we were ready to stretch our legs around the Sanctuary Wood museum.
Pictured: some slightly distracted gunners.
Sanctuary Wood was named in 1914 during the First Battle of Ypres for an area of woodland British soldiers sheltered in to escape from the fighting. Within months, the trees were completely destroyed by intense artillery fire and the hill they stood on scarred by thousands of miles of trenches. Some of the British trenches remain, giving Mr Long an excellent opportunity to stand in No Man’s Land and explain the everyday concerns of trench life – keeping your head down, taking care of your feet, and watching out for rats.
Ms Pavlyk led the charge through the trenches, although the good weather meant Year 9 didn’t quite get the authentic experience wading through the mud that the Battles of Ypres became synonymous with
We took a short coach ride to the Passchendaele Museum, which featured a mixture of exhibits and hands on experiences with artefacts recovered from the battlefields. The Third Battle of Ypres cost 250,000 British lives, fought over a stretch of land our coach took 15 minutes to cross. Along the way, we took in the hundreds of military cemeteries maintained by the Commonwealth War Graves Commission, contrasting with the quiet Belgian suburbs reminding us that war takes place in peoples’ back gardens, and in their homes – and that even a century later we live with the legacy of conflict. We ended the day in Ypres at the Leonidas Chocolate Shop for some souvenir shopping before setting off back to Britain.
The town of Ypres – almost all these seemingly historical buildings needed to be rebuilt after the War.
