Tag: Holyhead

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No-Man’s Land and Trenches

Several vertical aerial photos in Greg’s collection show the devastated wastes of no-man’s land, and systems of interconnected  trenches.  The photos are all undated, in fact completely unmarked, so the locations aren’t specified on any of them either.  The photos might well have been taken during joyrides in these post-armistice days, when it was (a) safer than it used to be and (b) something to do.

No-Man’s Land

No-man's land
“No-man’s land”. Click for larger image. Credit: Greg’s War Collection
No-man's land
An even more featureless view of no-man’s land. Click for larger image. Credit: Greg’s War Collection

Trenches

Trenches
Trenches, vertical aerial view. Click for larger image. Credit: Greg’s War Collection
Trenches
More trenches, vertical aerial view. Click for larger image. Credit: Greg’s War Collection

Locations

No-Man’s Land

I haven’t been able to work out the locations for any of these photographs.  The no-man’s land images in particular offer very little to go on: just a few fragments of road, and the odd ribbon of trenches. Wherever they were must have been between the opposing lines for quite some time, given the density of shell holes. 

The first photograph is used as the header image for the Western Front page.

Trenches

The photos showing the trench systems ought in principle to be easier to identify since the trenches were regularly mapped.  But there were a lot of them, and pinning them down hasn’t (yet) proved possible.

I had wondered whether at least one of them might have been taken on the Estaires-Lys Line, a few miles east of Merville on the River Lys.  This was one of Greg’s regular haunts when he was based at Rely.  And there was another reason that he might have paid some attention to the trenches in that area.  British forces had (and still have) a habit of giving familiar names to unfamiliar places.  On the Estaires-Lys Line, various strongholds and emplacements had names of Welsh towns.  Among them was Holyhead, where Greg was from.  So you could imagine him taking an aerial shot of “Holyhead” to take back to the family in Holyhead.

Here are the “Welsh towns” mapped in 1918, on this extract from square G of 1:40,000 map sheet 36. The 50 x 50 yd reference for “Holyhead” is 36 G 27 a 1 4, below the Balloon Bed in the centre.

Map of German trenches on the Estaires-Lys Line
German trenches, with features named after Welsh towns, on the Estaires-Lys Line. From a 1:10,000 trench map dated 10 July 1918. Each numbered square is 1,000 yds. Click for larger image. Map credit: TNA/IWM/Great War Digital.

And here is the location today: 

The location of Holyhead today on an image adapted from Google maps.
The location of “Holyhead” on the Estaires-Lys Line today on an image adapted from Google maps. (For some reason Google labels the River Lys by its Flemish/Dutch name of Leie, even in France.) Click to go to Google maps.

But, attractive though this theory is, I have been unable to match up the trench photographs with the trench maps!  So the locations must remain unidentified, for now at least.

 

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Tuesday 1 October 1918 – Heading Off Back to France

It was probably today that Greg started off on his journey back at Holyhead station. He would have travelled from North Wales, through England to France.

LNWR train at Holyhead station.
An LNWR train stands at Holyhead station prior to departure. Click for larger image. Credit: oldukphotos.com. The LNWR Society identifies (here) the train formation in this photograph as Jubilee class No 1915 ‘Implacable’ heading the royal train in March 1900, on the occasion of Queen Victoria’s last visit to Ireland. So the photo is over 18 years earlier than Greg’s journey, but it gives the general idea – especially as the buildings of Holyhead station looked essentially the same as late as the 1960s!

The return journey would have been essentially retracing the outbound trip on 18 September 1918 – something like:

  • Train from Holyhead to London Euston 
  • Euston Square to Victoria via London Underground (Circle Line)
  • Train from London Victoria to Folkestone
  • Ferry from Folkestone to Boulogne
  • Train from Boulogne to Aire
    • Either via Desvres, Lumbres and St Omer,
    • Or (less likely)  along the circuitous route by which he arrived on 2 June 1918 from Berck Plage, via Étaples, Montreuil, Hesdin, St Pol and Chocques, and 
  • Tender from Aire-sur-la-Lys to Rely

 

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Wednesday 18 September 1918 – On Leave till 2 October

Today is the first day of a two week stretch of leave for Greg.  He had been granted leave in the UK via Boulogne.  Meanwhile, the British front continues eastwards.

Log Book

Log BookLog Book

LEAVE. 18 SEPT - 2 OCT.

Leave in the UK

Greg would almost certainly have gone home to the family in Holyhead, North Wales.  The journey would probably have taken him a couple of days, and is likely to have gone something like this:

  • Tender from Rely to Aire-sur-la-Lys
  • Train from Aire to Boulogne
    • Either via St Omer, Lumbres and Desvres (see below)
    • Or(less likely)  back along the circuitous route by which he arrived on 2 June 1918 from Berck Plage, via Chocques, St Pol, Hesdin, Montreuil and Étaples
  • Ferry from Boulogne to Folkestone
  • Train from Folkestone to London Victoria
  • Victoria to Euston Square via London Underground (Circle Line)
  • Train from London Euston to Holyhead

On the first leg of the journey, the Aire to Boulogne route via St Omer would have been like this:

Aire-sur-la-Lys to Boulogne route map
Greg’s probable route from Aire-sur-la-Lys to Boulogne, shown on a modern map (courtesy Google). Click for a larger image.

And the last leg – London Euston to Holyhead – would have been the easiest, even though the longest.  There was a good, fast service from Euston to Holyhead, because it was the route that carried the post to and from Ireland.  

From end to end Greg’s route to Holyhead may have been like this.  It is remarkable for how little of it is in France.  Although the Western Front must have seemed a world away, the line in Lys sector was in reality not far from the French coast…although by September 1918 it was getting further day by day.

Map of a possible route taken by Greg from Aire-sur-la-Lys to Holyhead
A possible route taken by Greg from Aire-sur-la-Lys to Holyhead, on a modern map (courtesy Google). The route between Folkestone and London assumes running via Ashford and Maidstone. Click for larger image.

Back On the Front

In the meantime, looking east from Aire, the British front line had by this morning got well to the east of Laventie and was almost at Armentières:

The British Front on the morning of 18 September 1918
The British Front on the morning of 18 September 1918. Adapted from a map accompanying General Haig’s despatches on the final British offensive. Click for larger image. Map credit: IWM/TNA/GreatWarDigital.

Next up…

Although Greg isn’t back from leave until 2 October, there will be occasional posts in the interim.

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