ALONG THE FLANDERS FRONT

Dominion, Volume 11, Issue 101, 22 January 1918, Page 5

ALONG THE FLANDERS FRONT

THE BATTLE GROUND OF THE CENTURIES WHERE THE HUNS WERE BROKEN (Published by Authority of the War Office, per favour of the Royal Colonial Institute.) Since July 31, 1917, tho attention, of the whole world has been drawn towards what is loosely called tho Yprcs front, where some of the fiercest fighting of tho whole war haß taken place, "he country east of a line between the Lys and the soa has been the arena for great battles all through' history. Its geography' sufficiently explains that fact. Tho vast plain between tho sea and the Ardennes has always naturally invited battles. Embracing non of tho cbssic obstacles to tho deployment of la' ' .'-'-forces it is tho inevitable scene of u'at manoeuvre battles. Tt is there' hat tho would-be conqueror has staked his destiny. It is there that thoso Ho assailed havo made their last stand.

Starting from the sea, there is first that curious dune country, where ;u tho 17th contury Turenne defeated Conde. These dunes, or low whincovered sand hills, form a ribbon •of gold between tho blue of tho ocean and the green of tho Flanders plain. This strip is at its widest somo two tniles in breadth. In one place, the Hoog Bliker at Coxyde, the sand hills attain an elevation of over a hundred feet. Theso crystallised waves of sand out off the sea from tho marshes, am; form a barrier between tho ocean and tho land. In them trenches are very hard to construct, and still harder to, maintain.

In _ the particular area we aro considering the marsh land begins at Nieuport. Everywhere some feet below sea level, it is broken up by sluggish streams, of which the chief is the Yser, canalised from Nieuport to Dixmude. It is a land of lagoons and ponds, percolated by those waterfiands °r, dykes, which are tho predominant features of this curious, spongy land. In the not too distant past it Was reclaimed from the sea and preserved from its attack by a system of sluices. If these sluices were to fail the sea would stealthily reclaim its old domain for a distance of twenty miles to the south. Water is still tho dominant element. Through this marsh land, called "Noordland" by tho people of the Ypres district, the roads and railways are flamed on causeways, admirably suited to defenoe, as was provl- '/V 4 ? 10 battle of the Yser. The chief bridges across the Yser are, naturally, at towns, such as Dixmude and iNiieuportj and it was to make good these bndgo-heads that the Germans hurled a hundred thousand men at tho two places. t Tins region has another pecufianty East of the Yser it is lairly thickly wooded. Houthulst, for example, is a good-sized forost; west of the river there is hardly a bush. it is densely populated. So numerous and close together are the vilages and hamlets that tho district has + d ,°m° lu 'S° town. ■Windmills, too, are like the sands of the seashore, tor multitude, and wher- *? nd ? r , s St encounters a r Flemish spires and windl " ; ■ * rom % of some of the -i? P° sslble t0 pick out at least turn^r/'il? 868 ' /''out es > the nan° „ he «»% changes, and the plain ends there to the west in a range of lulls, slight elevations in themselves, but none the less absolutely dominating the whole region. From "Pitnn i n MI i S m C " SSOI, tLe famons J' 1 . 0 ' d . 6 Cass el," it is said to be possible to pick out on a fine day one hundred and thirty villages 'tt is one of the .historic places of tho low counties ; three, battles have been fought, for. it and it was from there of dire ° ted th ° Battla

The Battle that Saved the World. mdn 1S lan i. d ' at , onoo lo «', flat, and ££? testy? *s ot warriors. It was there that in the of Vhnf 1914 >was fought that Battle pL;I S i lv ; hlcl1 was so implacable, ciucial, and decisive that the French speak of it as "La Bataille." Its ■n l 7 stlll *° fc f «"y known to the °rld. lhe mists-which have obscured +W 6 y J " st P as f ln g away. AVhen that process is complete it will be seen to have been, without exaggeration. hkfrnr defensive battles ot history, lhe greatness of the stake— it is hardly too much to say that it was the future of civilisation— the fero.i city and length of the struggle the intervention of the fleet, the coming of the water, all combine to give that ■battle an epic quality with which only, the Marne can be compared. It was fought by the remnant of sixBelgian divisions, who held the line irom the sea to Dixmude, with splendid assistaiico Irom the' French; especially ! the Fusihers Manns, the hews of JJixmude, and the famous 4 2nd Division. Further south came the French <inny of Be gium from Dixmude to 1 pies, and lastly the British army tl 1 ° m ,r P'- e 5 to , ys ' At one tini « the district was called the "Tower of iiabeJ, so many races were represent- + ?' i i m h lst ory of thafc battle cannot be told hore. To show its ferocity twenty terrific attacks were n.ade on Dixnnide m as many days; the famous Bouele d'Yser round Lombaertzyde was the scene of incredible ,mrfl IC +v, u seemed lost in tho north the British monitors helped to save the day, one of the few instances ot tho direct action of sea-power this was has revealed. When the line cf e , iser had gone between Nieuport and Dixmude, and the battle seemed irretrievably lost, M. L. Kogge, garde Watennghe, or Controller of the Sluices, succeeded in flooding those terrible ten miles. Then the Germans waded waist-deep through the floods and stormed the Belgian last line, onlv to be hurled out by a final iieroic charge, when men and horses and guns disappeared m the foul, dark waters and the Kaiser closed his glasses and turned his back on the .scene of his de•i.u ii ( u,a ' e on 'y to be compared with the charge of tho Prussian Guard at (jheluvelt, which as it rolled back ■before tho remnant of the British Army marked tho close of the fiercest nattle m history. Sholl-Trap Farm.

In the northern area, till tho slight British set-back tho other day, vlie hush of exhaustion has ever brooded over the dunes and Howls. But tho area between Boesinghe and Ypres was the scone of that terrible and confused struggle, the second Battle of Ypros, the gas battle, which resulted in tho Allies retiring about four miles, so that the salient was greatly shortened. Tho most famoufl spot in that inferno was Shell-Trap Farm, between tho YpresLangemarck and the Ypres-St. Julicn roads. It was once a Canadian beadquarters, and the centre of all tho bloodiest fighting. It is, or was, the most famous building in Canadian history. Tho area between Ypros and the Lys, formerly the southern half of tho Ypres salient, and tho scene of the fiercest fight in tho first Battlo of Ypres, has recontly attained added fame from tho Battle of Messinos, fought on June 7, when the British stormed the ridgn and burst through to the plain below. That was an inevitable preliminary to any great operations in that area. With Messinos the enemy lost all his tromaticlous advantages of observation. Sir Douglas Haig then wrote to General Plumer: "The

full effect of this victory cannot be estimated yet, but that it will be very great is certain." It is oil this classio arena, drenched with tho blood of tho warriors of all ages, still echoing with the drowning crios of tho Germans in the floods, tho defiant cheers of the British as they broke the Prussian Guard, and tile thunder of tho mines of Mossines that this nsrr Crania has just been staged.