Australians on the Western Front 1914-1918 : The Journey

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The journey

The journey
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An Australian journey on the Western Front

From Ieper (Ypres) in Belgium to Péronne in France is 133 kilometres by road. The landscape between the two towns – across West Flanders in Belgium and the French departments of the Nord, Pas-de-Calais and the Somme – is strewn with reminders that this was a vast and historic battleground. In the middle of fields, around bends in country roads, on hillsides and in villages, towns and cities are hundreds of cemeteries. They hold the victims of battles whose names were once known throughout the English-speaking world – Somme, Ypres, Arras, Vimy, Bullecourt, Loos, Amiens. The northern third of the Western Front ran through this region during the ‘Great War’ of 1914 to 1918. Responsible for its defence were the forces of Great Britain and its Empire assembled into a combined army – the British Expeditionary Force (BEF).

The men of the Australian Imperial Force came to the Western Front in April 1916. The ‘diggers’, as they became known, went into the trenches south of the French town of Armentières and from then until early October 1918 they fought in virtually all the major campaigns of the BEF against the Imperial German Army. On 11 November 1918, as the AIF was preparing to go into battle once again, the Armistice was declared. During those two and a half years 295,000 Australian soldiers fought on the Western Front and 179,537 – 60 percent – became casualties. More than 46,000 of them were killed in action or died of wounds.

Between Ieper and Péronne, and sometimes a little further afield, 28,512 Australians lie in cemeteries tended by the Commonwealth War Graves Commission. Each of them has a headstone on which is engraved a name, unit and date of death.

A further 7,200 are buried but have not been identified and their headstones carry inscriptions such as ‘An Australian Soldier of the Great War – Known Unto God’ or ‘An Australian Corporal of the Great War – Known Unto God’. These men make up one part of the ‘missing’ who have ‘no known grave’. The other part of the ‘missing’ consists of 11,078 Australians of whom nothing was ever found for burial. In all, there are 18,278 ‘men with no known grave’. Their names are commemorated on memorials.

The Menin Road, Ypres, 14 September 1917. [AWM E00700]

This website is a journey to 40 significant locations along the old BEF section of the ‘Western Front’ from Nieuwpoort, on the North Sea coast of Belgium, to Paris. Most of these sites tell of what happened to the ‘diggers’ at places like the Menin Road, Messines, Fromelles, Flers, Dernancourt and Montbrehain. Today there is little to see which resembles what the Western Front was like when it was a maze of trenches and cratered landscapes. But standing in Toronto Avenue Cemetery in Ploegsteert Wood or driving around the roads of the Somme it is possible to sense the terrible nature of the conflict which once raged in this countryside. At each memorial and cemetery the commemorated names point to personal stories of battle and the sadness that each man’s death brought to family and friends far away.

On such a journey it is impossible not to see that Australians fought as part of a huge Allied force composed of the soldiers of many nations. Some of the locations visited tell of the experiences of British, Canadian and Newfoundland soldiers as well as the enormous bloodletting involved in France’s efforts to drive the German army from its soil. The negotiations which brought an end to the fighting (but not the war) can be sensed in the forest of Compiègne. Here the Armistice, which came into operation at the ‘eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month’, was signed.

The Château de Versailles from the gardens. [DVA]

At the end of the journey in Paris is the magnificent Chateau de Versailles where for the first time a Prime Minister of the Commonwealth of Australia put Australia’s name to a major international treaty, the ‘Treaty of Versailles’. On that day, 28 June 1919, the ‘Great War’ with Germany was finally at an end.

The material presented about each of these locations is not a definitive history of what happened to the AIF, or the soldiers of other nations, at these places. What it seeks to provide is something for those visiting the site, or exploring it online, who want some understanding of why a particular Australian unit chose this or that spot to place a memorial or why the individuals buried in certain cemeteries offer insight into forgotten battles and actions. The website covers all major AIF memorials in France and Belgium as well as memorials and locations central to the Australian story such as the Menin Gate or the countryside around the French village of Flers on the Somme.

At each location, where relevant, the site commentary features the stories of Australians who fought there. Mostly it features individual soldiers who were known only to those who fought with them. The contributions of the leaders and highly decorated men of the AIF have been well covered elsewhere – in official histories, unit histories, historical publications and exhibitions. For those who wish to understand the full and complex story of Australia’s participation in operations in France and Belgium between 1914 and 1918 there are plenty of links and references throughout the site.

Many Australians will never be able to visit the old Western Front and see for themselves where men and women from all parts of the Commonwealth and all walks of life fought and died. So the website presents dozens of recent photographs of headstones, cemeteries, memorials and French and Belgian landscapes. Supplementing these are photographs taken by British and Australian official war photographers between 1916 and 1918 showing the often appalling conditions in which soldiers fought on the Western Front as well as scenes of the front-line areas. Use has also been made of the large collection of official Australian war art housed at the Australian War Memorial in Canberra. Often an artist can render the emotional sense of a place or experience better than a camera.

There is no set way to undertake this Australian journey around the Western Front. Travellers determined to see all there is to see could start their trip at the North Sea coast of Belgium where, at the very end of the old front line, Australian tunnellers burrowed into the sand dunes. The travellers could then work their way south to Paris.

The tower of the Australian National War Memorial, Villers–Bretonneux. [DVA]

Other visitors might have time for just one important site such as the Australian National Memorial at Villers-Bretonneux, or to attend the famous sounding of the Last Post under the Menin Gate at Ieper (Ypres).

Those thousands of Australians who go to Paris without travelling north to the Somme or Flanders could visit the Galerie des Glaces (Hall of Mirrors) at the Chateau de Versailles to sense the significance to the nation’s history of Prime Minister Billy Hughes signing the Treaty of Versailles there on 28 June 1919.

‘Virtual’ tourists, of course, are free to navigate around as they wish.

However we make the journey we should remember those Australians of earlier times who longed to go to France and Belgium but were never able to. In the aftermath of World War I, thousands of homes throughout Australia mourned the loss of someone who went off to war never to return. That generation endured personal losses on a horrendous scale. The spouses, mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters, cousins and friends of those whose graves and memorials lay thousands of kilometres away lived in an age when overseas travel was well beyond the reach of ordinary people.

But the world has shrunk. Thousands now go to Gallipoli and many are also spending some time on the old Western Front. While visiting the cemeteries and memorials we could lay a poppy for those who never had the opportunity to visit, and we could remember the anguish of the people at home, such as one Australian mother who lost her son at Gallipoli on 25 April 1915. Eight years after the war she wrote:

[If] only I could see your grave, I would die happy.

The journey

An Australian journey on the Western Front

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