Etaples to Arras: A Journey

Posted on April 27, 2024 by

10 Comments

In a special edition of the podcast which marks the end of Season 6, this episode was recorded on The Old Front Line where we take a journey from the vast Etaples Military Cemetery, look at the Tank Gunnery School at Merriment, Douglas Haig and ‘GHQ’ at Montreuil, and then travel via a small village up to Arras and the Arras Memorial.

Season 6 will continue with two more Question & Answers episodes and then after a short break the Podcast will return in early May.

Got a question about this episode or any others? Drop your question into the Old Front Line Discord Server or email the podcast.

BATTLEFIELD MAP:

Podcast Extras:

Category: Arras, Behind The Lines, Podcast Episode, WW1 Cemeteries, WW1 History

10 Comments on “Etaples to Arras: A Journey”

  2. An excellent episode. I particularly liked the bit in Arras which makes a great base for visits. As mentioned a proper town with lots of bars and restaurants for the evenings and lots to see including the excellent New Zealand Tunnels which shouldn’t be missed. The Saturday morning market is also a fantastic spot to get supplies before heading off to the battlefields.

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  4. Nice one…didn’t realise Haig’s statue was upside down for 4 years or so…..Good story!

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  5. Great picture of the headstone of Luther Jagger with the memorial plaque.

    I found the graves of Florence and Albert Grover, so close together, quite moving. Imagine being badly wounded, having your wife over to visit you and then she dies. How can you cope with that? But it must have happend more I think, given the Spanish flu going around like wildfire.

    In Mont Huon I also noticed the grave of a woman, died December 1918.

    And thanks, again, for providing me with more things to put on my need-to-see list.

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  6. Thanks for great podcast. So thought provoking I listened to it twice. Not uncommon with your podcasts!

    The comments about Haig reminded me that many of those who heap opprobrium on him forget that he was just one of many Field Marshals of all the combatant nations and whose campaigns usually resulted in high casualties for the troops that they commanded. Yet they seem to escape these adverse comments.

    These critics also forget that these commanders in their own way tried to break the deadlock and slaughter of trench warfare, e.g the tank, poison gas and the creeping barrage etc. I’m reminded of something I read about 15 years while browsing in my local Waterstones. I can’t recall the name of the book or the author, possibly Keegan or Terraine and they emphasised how low (in relative terms) our casualties were in relation to France, Germany, Austria-Hungry and Russia. To such an extent that the author said that in comparison to these countries, the British army was in the right place at the right time!

    Thinking about this drew me to John Terraine’s 1982 address to the WFA on the Generals, where he expresses broadly similar sentiments, see link below.

    Perhaps the final word on this should be left to General ( Butcher) Mangin who said that”Whatever you do you lose a lot of men”.

    https://www.westernfrontassociation.com/world-war-i-articles/the-generals-john-terraines-1982-address-to-the-western-front-association/

    I had no idea about the background to the high number of missing at Arras. You indicated that this may have been in part to the volume of artillery fire and this reminded of a private memorial in St Oswald’s Chuchyard at Winwick, situated between Newton-le-Willows and Warrington, where my parents were brought up, I lived there as a child as well.

    The monument to the 62nd Division said “Sacred to the 99 officers and 4000 men of the 62nd Division who fell in the attack at Bullcourt on 3rd May 1917, they perished under artillery fire….

    See also link below.

    https://www.iwm.org.uk/memorials/item/memorial/42929

    You do a great job!

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  7. Been to Arras several times and really enjoyed it, especially Wellington quarry. You have given me a lot of new ideas for a visit.

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