Singing Semele

A long time in the planning, I finally made my pilgrimage to Ieper for Remembrance Day.

It was a very moving experience. I arrived on the 10th of November and found my hotel. Settled in with a cup of tea then braved the cold and the masses of people to attend the Last Post Ceremony at the Menin Gate Memorial. This ceremony has been happening every night at 8pm since the 1920s. I managed to get quite a good position, under the Gate on the top of a platform.

The following day, on Remembrance Day, I joined the Poppy Parade. As part of this, you take a handful of poppy petals and march through the streets of Ieper (with the military bands!) and deposit your petals in baskets when you reach the Menin Gate. During the 11am ceremony, these poppies are released through the three holes on the top of the Menin Gate and to create a very magical moment.

It’s a very emotional place to be. There are over 54,000 name inscribed on this memorial and they are only some of the missing. They couldn’t fit all of the names on this memorial so some are commemorated at Tyne Cot. It’s overwhelming to think about the amount of grief associated with just one name on the memorial. I even found three brothers who were all killed on the same day. I took this photo to try and give some perspective to how big the memorial is, how many names are on just one panel:

It was good to see that there were a range of nationalities coming together to commemorate:

In the afternoon, I escaped the crowds in Ieper by catching the train to Poperinghe. This is another important town associated with the First World War for two main (and very constrasting) reasons.

1) This used to be the place where they executed the British deserters.

I think that these days, many of the men that were executed in this place might have been diagnosed with Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome. So sad.

2) In contrast to this, Poperinghe, being one of the first villages behind the British front lines, was where Talbot House (or Toc-H) is located. It was set up as a place of refuge where men of any rank could get together and read, play cards or just socialise. Interestingly, there was no alcohol allowed.

Talbot House has a beautiful chapel in the attic (to be closer to God!) where many soldiers spent time. Some were even baptised and confirmed. Sadly, many of them never returned and there are items in the chapel dedicated to their memory.

The following day, I spent the morning walking around Ieper. This town was completely flattened in the First World War. It is a fascinating place because, being rebuilt to strict guidelines, it really does look like a medieval market town. The Cathedral, for instance, looks like it has been there forever:

There are only a few telltale signs such as a few of the original damaged artefacts in a glassed off area at one end.

I also went to St George’s Memorial Church which was built after the war and everything in it (chairs, font, bells, etc) were donated in memory of someone. It’s quite an overwhelming place to think what each plaque represents:

I also took a photo of the Poppy Field that had sprung up next to the Menin Gate memorial:

That same afternoon I went on a Battlefield Tour around the Ieper Salient. The gentleman who took my small tour (5 people) was utterly engaging. He had been doing tours since the 70s, had met many WW1 veterans and had previously been the curator of Talbot House. I was amazed that he had such an enthusiasm for teaching others after all these years and he told me that there is alway something to learn. For my benefit, he took us to many sites that were siginificant to Australians. One thing that had a huge impact on me was how many unknown graves there were. I had no idea. Tyne Cot cemetery has about 70% unknown graves there.

As mentioned above, this is the other place that has a memorial to the missing.

I’ll end this post with a grave at Tyne Cot which had an anti-war inscription: “Sacrified to the fallacy that war can end war”. When walking across the cemeteries, one does wonder ‘Why?’. I also found myself thanking them all.