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Remembering Fromelles
Remembering Fromelles
More than 90 years after he was killed in battle, the last of 250 British and Australian soldiers has been re-buried with full military honours in northern France.
The soldiers' remains were discovered two years ago in a mass grave near the site of the Battle of Fromelles.
On the 94th anniversary of the start of the battle, a special service marked the final re-burial.
The other 249 bodies were buried in the new Fromelles Military Cemetery earlier this year
More than 5,000 Australian and 1,500 Britions were killed or captured in the Battle of Fromelles.
The dead were dumped in communal graves by German forces after the fighting ended.
An Australian amateur historian discovered one of the burial sites in a muddy field on the edge of a small wood in 2008.Of those remains, 205 have been identified as Australian but only 96 have been named. Of the 250 men, three were confirmed to be British but not named and 42 are still classified as unknown.
The disastrous attack at Fromelles on the night of 19 July 1916, the first engagement undertaken by the Australian 5th Division on the Western Front, also proved to be the most costly. By the time the action was called off the next morning, the Australians had lost 5,533 men killed, wounded and missing. Casualties for the British 61st Division, who attacked alongside the Australians, numbered 1,547.
The Commission’s records suggest that between 19 and 21 July 1916 the Australian dead at Fromelles amounted to 1,780, the British 503. Many of those killed in the engagement could not be accounted for at the time. Historians have long speculated that up to 400 of the missing dead were recovered by the Germans in the days following the attack and buried behind their lines. Painstaking research led to the possible identification of several mass burial pits on the edge of Pheasant Wood near Fromelles. In May 2008 the Australian Government asked the Commission to oversee a limited excavation to establish whether or not the pits contained remains. The three week dig found conclusive evidence that substantial numbers of Australian and British soldiers had been buried in five of the eight pits identified.
The Battle of Fromelles, 19 July 1916
In the early evening of Wednesday 19 July 1916, near the village of Fromelles, in northern France, Australian and British infantry of two divisions attacked a 4,000 yard section of the German frontline centred on a notorious strongpoint called the ‘Sugar Loaf’. Advancing over unfavourable ground, in clear view of resolute and expectant defenders, the attackers suffered terrible casualties in a matter of minutes. The action turned into a bloody catastrophe.
The outcome of complex and muddled planning, the Battle of Fromelles in its final form represented a purely local diversionary attack which aimed to distract German reserves from the great Somme offensive, some 50 miles to the south. The attacking forces comprised two recent arrivals to the Western Front: 5th Australian Division and British 61st Division. The attack frontage covered the junction-point of First and Second Armies: on the right, 61st Division held the line from the Fauquissart-Trivelet road to ‘Bond Street’ communication trench; 5th Australian Division occupied the front from Bond Street to Cordonnerie Farm. Overlooked by German observers on nearby Aubers Ridge, the attackers faced a strong enemy line running north-eastwards to the Sugar Loaf, whence it angled eastward to Delangre Farm.
link to a video of the sevice [url]http://www.heart.co.uk/miltonkeynes/show...soldier-1/[/URL]
link [url]http://www.cwgc.org/fromelles/?page=engl...-history/1[/URL]
Remembering Fromelles
More than 90 years after he was killed in battle, the last of 250 British and Australian soldiers has been re-buried with full military honours in northern France.
The soldiers' remains were discovered two years ago in a mass grave near the site of the Battle of Fromelles.
On the 94th anniversary of the start of the battle, a special service marked the final re-burial.
The other 249 bodies were buried in the new Fromelles Military Cemetery earlier this year
More than 5,000 Australian and 1,500 Britions were killed or captured in the Battle of Fromelles.
The dead were dumped in communal graves by German forces after the fighting ended.
An Australian amateur historian discovered one of the burial sites in a muddy field on the edge of a small wood in 2008.Of those remains, 205 have been identified as Australian but only 96 have been named. Of the 250 men, three were confirmed to be British but not named and 42 are still classified as unknown.
The disastrous attack at Fromelles on the night of 19 July 1916, the first engagement undertaken by the Australian 5th Division on the Western Front, also proved to be the most costly. By the time the action was called off the next morning, the Australians had lost 5,533 men killed, wounded and missing. Casualties for the British 61st Division, who attacked alongside the Australians, numbered 1,547.
The Commission’s records suggest that between 19 and 21 July 1916 the Australian dead at Fromelles amounted to 1,780, the British 503. Many of those killed in the engagement could not be accounted for at the time. Historians have long speculated that up to 400 of the missing dead were recovered by the Germans in the days following the attack and buried behind their lines. Painstaking research led to the possible identification of several mass burial pits on the edge of Pheasant Wood near Fromelles. In May 2008 the Australian Government asked the Commission to oversee a limited excavation to establish whether or not the pits contained remains. The three week dig found conclusive evidence that substantial numbers of Australian and British soldiers had been buried in five of the eight pits identified.
The Battle of Fromelles, 19 July 1916
In the early evening of Wednesday 19 July 1916, near the village of Fromelles, in northern France, Australian and British infantry of two divisions attacked a 4,000 yard section of the German frontline centred on a notorious strongpoint called the ‘Sugar Loaf’. Advancing over unfavourable ground, in clear view of resolute and expectant defenders, the attackers suffered terrible casualties in a matter of minutes. The action turned into a bloody catastrophe.
The outcome of complex and muddled planning, the Battle of Fromelles in its final form represented a purely local diversionary attack which aimed to distract German reserves from the great Somme offensive, some 50 miles to the south. The attacking forces comprised two recent arrivals to the Western Front: 5th Australian Division and British 61st Division. The attack frontage covered the junction-point of First and Second Armies: on the right, 61st Division held the line from the Fauquissart-Trivelet road to ‘Bond Street’ communication trench; 5th Australian Division occupied the front from Bond Street to Cordonnerie Farm. Overlooked by German observers on nearby Aubers Ridge, the attackers faced a strong enemy line running north-eastwards to the Sugar Loaf, whence it angled eastward to Delangre Farm.
link to a video of the sevice [url]http://www.heart.co.uk/miltonkeynes/show...soldier-1/[/URL]
link [url]http://www.cwgc.org/fromelles/?page=engl...-history/1[/URL]