2018 will have seen plenty of commemorations and events to mark the 100th anniversary of the end of WW1. And, quite possibly, 2018 will be host to the last significant events of this kind – certainly in my lifetime. Fewer and fewer people will have had direct contact with someone who took part in WW1 and so the atmosphere of any events and the nature of visitors to sites will change in the future.
So, if you haven’t been to the Somme – or Flanders – 2018 is a good time to visit.
Handy maps are the IGN 25000 series: 2408O, 2408E and 2407O (O=Ouest, E=Est) - available at www.dash4it.co.uk
Handy maps are the IGN 25000 series: 2408O, 2408E and 2407O (O=Ouest, E=Est) - available at www.dash4it.co.uk
The main centre for a WW1 related visit to ‘The Somme’ – (the name refers to the department rather than the river) – is Albert, a town a few miles north of the river Somme between Amiens and Arras. The Battle of the Somme was a series of engagements, including the Battle of Albert, that took place along a stretch of the frontline from Gommecourt southwards and then eastwards that began on 1st July 1916– and so that is a good place to start.
If you opt to stay in Albert start with an 11-mile leg up the Ancre valley then on to Gommecourt – or you can take a train from Albert to Miraumont for a six miler.
Booking.com
It takes an hour or so to reach the D6 Puisuex-Gommecourt road from Arras but be aware of a couple of tracks masquerading as roads in Strava. In leaving Arras, an attractive town with two well-preserved and unique town squares, you pass the Beurains Road cemetery on the D917. Once you have left the main road, take the Rue Robespierre, which has a cul-de-sac sign but allows access for cyclists on a lovely quiet road, Chemin de Mercatel.
Find your way to Douchy les Fayette then take an unclassified road south toward Bucquoy. This passes a bunker on the crest of a hill.
This is a very nice ride and eventually you’ll reach Bucquoy -and a Carrefour that’s open on Sunday til 1pm – very handy in France. Stock up.
Head towards the D6, on which you’ll pass Rossignol Wood Cemetery, then the turn-off to Gommecourt Cemetery No 2. Continue into Gommecourt on the D6, after which you’ll pass Gommecourt Wood and its cemetery.
This was pretty much where the battles began on July 1st1916.
Heading on you’ll reach Fonquevilliers, known as Funky Villas to the troops way back when. Take a right to head to Hebuterne. As you approach the western edge of Gommecourt Wood keep an eye out for the German Bunker set thirty yards away from the road on the left. This is quite an eerie relic with its twisted steel and homely, pebbledashed concrete.
By now you might be gagging for a coffee so stop at the Café des Sports in Hebuterne - it is the only one for miles!
From Hebuterne go south east to Serre. The Serre Road was in the thick of it as it splices both frontlines and consequently there are several cemeteries to the west of Serre, close to the road to Beaumont Hamel and right on the Pais de Calais/Somme border.
I have a personal interest in the Serre Rd. After a family move, I discovered a large dark brown leather wallet among my late grandfather’s bits and pieces. I opened this to find medals and photos and another smaller fabric wallet. Inside this there were two neatly folded pieces of paper. I gingerly unfolded one. It was a communication advising of the imminent Armistice of 11/11/918. I unfolded the other. This was a hand-drawn map.
The map, after some research, turned out to be a depiction of the German and British frontlines and trenches as of 30 June 1916 either side of the Serre Rd. An ‘x’ marked a spot on the British side from which a dotted line crossed through the German trenches. This ‘x’ was the position of my father and his comrades at 7.20 on 1 July – the position from which they would ‘go over the top’. Of the 850 men in his battalion, fifty returned from the action of that morning.
The map, after some research, turned out to be a depiction of the German and British frontlines and trenches as of 30 June 1916 either side of the Serre Rd. An ‘x’ marked a spot on the British side from which a dotted line crossed through the German trenches. This ‘x’ was the position of my father and his comrades at 7.20 on 1 July – the position from which they would ‘go over the top’. Of the 850 men in his battalion, fifty returned from the action of that morning.
Set back from the Serre Rd up a track are the Sheffield and Luke Copse cemeteries then further west on the D919 are the two large Serre Rd Cemeteries, 1 and 2. I consulted my map to try and be as close as possible to that ‘x’, which was somewhere in a field of crops and so I had to be satisfied with a grass verge. (Do not traipse across land unless you do so on a marked path or track.)
Once you take the Beaumont Hamel Rd, the two Redan Ridge cemeteries become accessible via a track. These also contain those killed in action in 1914.
To the immediate west of Beaumont Hamel on the D163 keep an eye out for a steep path up a hill. This will take you – but not the bikes – up to Hawthorn Ridge and its infamous crater.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hawthorn_Ridge_Redoubt.
The ridge is now covered with a large copse but the deep, eerie crater is visible through the foliage. Worth the climb.
With time getting short after the ‘service roads’ I had to miss out Newfoundland Memorial Park – which provides me with an excuse to go again. This site, like that of Vimy Ridge a few miles away, is a tribute to those Canadians who died and provides an opportunity to see the remains of trenches.
Just a few yards on on the D163 is a Scottish monument. If you carry on to Auchonvillers you turn right on the D73 for the Newfoundland Park.
Moving on, south easterly, the D4151 takes you down a steep drop to the Ancre valley. Head towards Albert on the D50 to pick up the D73 for Thiepval, the huge memorial to the Somme. However, before you get to Thiepval, you pass the unusual and unmissable Ulster Memorial – a castle-like building on the left. Just past that there is the Connaught Cemetery.
The Thiepval visitors centre is well worth a visit before you walk around to the Luytens designed memorial overlooking the Ancre. This is the biggest British memorial of WW1 and honours the dead of each of the individual battles of the Somme at that time.
For more about Thiepval take a look at a previous visit at:
For more about Thiepval take a look at a previous visit at:
http://cycletouring-somme.blogspot.co.uk/2014/10/day-two.html
Allow an hour for the museum and memorial
The next key site is the Lochnager Crater near La Boiselle.
By now, there are cemeteries everywhere – by roads or set back in a valley - with many containing over a thousand graves.
The peaceful rural settings along with the immaculately maintained grass and headstones belie the horror of that day. In no way do I acknowledge any justification then or now for WW1 and these infamous battles. I visit these sites to remind myself of what ‘civilised’ people can do to one another. We read of atrocities – murders – everyday but this violence was legitimate at the time - not just the killing of soldiers but the orders given to soldiers to go over the top to certain death. Those orders are still legitimate.
Lochnager Crater is a 30m deep hole in the ground. Blown eight minutes after Hawthorn Ridge, it is named after the trench from which the excavation took place, itself probably named after the Scottish distillery. Unlike Hawthorn Ridge, the crater is fully visible and is maintained as a memorial. Walking its circumference takes five to ten minutes.
From here one can return to Albert or head towards Miraumont for the train back to Arras. The route to Miraumont allows visits to Mametz, the Welsh Mametz Wood Memorial, Mametz Wood and Montauban while passing many cemeteries.
If you do a tour in the autumn you maybe fortunate to see freshly dug-up WW1 unexploded shells by the side of a ploughed field. DO NOT TOUCH. These are still very much live and are removed by bomb disposal teams.
