1010 replies to this topic

[MartinBennitt]

Well I would guess we're talking Blackpool FC here, given your location and the reference to the tower. Problem is the only Seasider I can find -- thanks to the Forum's 'Footballers Died' thread -- is goalkeeper William 'Tommy' Fiske, KIA 22/05/1918 while with the border Regiment. CWGC says he is on the Soissons memorial to the missing, so where's his last resting place?

Another search reveals he was killed near Fismes, so guess you're there, or thereabouts

cheers Martin B

[flintwich]

www.fiskes.co.uk/Tommy



Guessed a Dundee Utd or Blackpool player



Well done, Martin, I was googling and found this when you posted.

[myos]

You are on the right lines, but his name is not that of a footballer, however you have mentioned his name.

Andy

[David Faulder]

What about Benny Green? KIA 26/4/1917 - But he is on Arras Memorial - so no resting place there.

David

[SteveMarsdin]

Stephen Blackpool ? Buried at Ovillers

[myos]

Correct Steve...your turn

Andy

[SteveMarsdin]

myos, on 27 August 2011 - 08:25 PM, said:

Correct Steve...your turn

Andy

Sorry for not returning to the thread sooner, I've been travelling back from Belgium. I'll try and think of another one but if anyone else fancies a go - be my guest !

[SteveMarsdin]

OK here goes.

I passed this cemetery yesterday on my way back from Belgium. During WW1 it was a French cemetery but after the armistice the French (and German) graves were removed and British ones re-interred there. The initial graves were mainly victims of a single air-raid. There is a Southern England connection  to both those graves and the WW2 graves there; in fact the WW2 graves have a more specific connection to my subsequent ferry crossing. What is the name of the cemetery ?

[SteveMarsdin]

By way of an additional clue, when I say, I passed the cemetery, I mean I could see it from the autoroute and it was within a few hundred meteres of the hard-shoulder. Apart from the first 20 minutes, my journey from Jamoigne to Calais was via an autoroute.

[seany]

I think it could be Bertnacre military Cemetery in north France on the way to Calais?

Quite a few were killed in an air raid, it used to be french and the regiment referred to is the Royal West Surreys?

Seany

SteveMarsdin, on 30 August 2011 - 12:53 PM, said:

By way of an additional clue, when I say, I passed the cemetery, I mean I could see it from the autoroute and it was within a few hundred meteres of the hard-shoulder. Apart from the first 20 minutes, my journey from Jamoigne to Calais was via an autoroute.

[SteveMarsdin]

Correct Seany,

I've never visited it but noticed the cemetery when driving back and looked it up.

Your turn now !

[seany]

Hurrah !

I'm standing in a farmers field in which my grandfather stood on the 14th June 1917. In front of me I can see a road that rises very steeply towards Messines. In front of me someone is building a truly awful looking house that ruins the view whilst to my left is a cemetery, small and, of course, beautifully maintained - its name sounds like how x-factor losing finalists will spend the rest of their careers. The local saint is patron of an artillery rank higher than my grandfathers. my question (eventually) what is the name of the nearest town?

good luck.

SteveMarsdin, on 31 August 2011 - 09:15 PM, said:

Correct Seany,

I've never visited it but noticed the cemetery when driving back and looked it up.

Your turn now !

[seany]

One good sleep later and no takers - too hard? here is a picture of where I am standing - it looks like a fairly good howitzer position to me. And another clue my Grandfather was a gunner so the higher rank was .......?

seany, on 02 September 2011 - 08:22 PM, said:

Hurrah !

I'm standing in a farmers field in which my grandfather stood on the 14th June 1917. In front of me I can see a road that rises very steeply towards Messines. In front of me someone is building a truly awful looking house that ruins the view whilst to my left is a cemetery, small and, of course, beautifully maintained - its name sounds like how x-factor losing finalists will spend the rest of their careers. The local saint is patron of an artillery rank higher than my grandfathers. my question (eventually) what is the name of the nearest town?

good luck.

Attached Files

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[SFayers]

Hi Seany,

At this time would your grandfather's section have been attached to 16th Heavy Artillery Group? If so I'd go for Wytschaete.

cheers

Steve

[SFayers]

Actually, scrap the last one seany - you're near Wulvergem aren't you? (Cabaret springs to mind!)

[seany]

You are correct - cabaret the fate of x-factor losers, St Quentin the patron saint of bombardiers and the 293 siege battery sitting in a field just outside Wulvergem - well done, your turn.

SFayers, on 03 September 2011 - 08:53 AM, said:

Actually, scrap the last one seany - you're near Wulvergem aren't you? (Cabaret springs to mind!)

[SFayers]

Thanks seany - I wasn't aware of the St Quentin / Bombardier connection!

[SFayers]

Ok, for my fourth penny........

In the summer of 1917 this place briefly had an association with Manchester.

Gunner 626025 William Kingham's battery was based very near here in December 1917; and he gave the following description of the area:

"A wide plain stretched before us - a plain of shell holes joined by greasy, yellow mud. No sign of kindly Nature anywhere - no grass, no hedges; nothing of man's useful labours, only the earth torn, ruined, degraded, as the fell work of man's destructive powers."

When my grandfather and his mates spent a miserable Christmas Day 1917 here, there would have been no turkey for Christmas dinner, and certainly no chicken!

Where am I?

[conner]

Passchendaele?

[SFayers]

conner, on 03 September 2011 - 07:43 PM, said:

Passchendaele?

No, but not many miles away from here........

[seany]

Pilckem ridge ?

[SFayers]

seany, on 03 September 2011 - 09:43 PM, said:

Pilckem ridge ?

No, not Pilckem, but again not overly far away.

The name of the place is very much contemporary - so you might have to get your trench maps out! There is still a farm on the site today, but I guess it doesn't share the same name it had during the war. I'll post another clue or two tomorrow - I'm off to roost!

[SFayers]

To continue with W. R. Kingham's description of the area:

"On our left stood a line of shattered skeletons of trees; they marked where ran, in a somewhat deep gulley, the little stream of the Lekkeboterbekke, dismal and encumbered with debris. Beyond the stream the ground rose slightly , while, limiting the dreariness in front of us, could be dimly seen the higher land around Westroosebeke, the extension of the Passchendaele Ridge."

On the 16th August the 11th Battalion Manchester Regiment briefly held this place, but had to fall back. It actually fell three days later at 6.45am on the 19th to a female tank of 1 Tank Brigade and infantry of the 1/8th Worcestershire Regiment - part of an action that was considered to be "the first definite success gained through the use of tanks in the 1917 offensives". To quote Chris McCarthy the place was "harassed by a female tank which ditched 50 yards away (as many as one hundred Germans ran away from this pillbox and the surrounding bunkers and the majority of them were shot down). The strongpoint was occupied and all seven tanks managed to return from the action."

No foul play here!


Cheers

Steve

[seany]

Duck lodge farm ?

Duck lodge farm? Maison du Hibou ?

Ducks are fowls and neither chicken or turkey. Owls are not but the 11th Battallion did attack and hold this house of owls briefly

I guess Duck lodge farm. no changed my mind re the tank action it must be the house of owls - so i gues Maison du Hibou






quote name='SFayers' timestamp='1315136338' post='1639393']
To continue with W. R. Kingham's description of the area:

"On our left stood a line of shattered skeletons of trees; they marked where ran, in a somewhat deep gulley, the little stream of the Lekkeboterbekke, dimal and encumbered with debris. Beyond the stream the ground rose slightly , while, limiting the dreariness in front of us, could be dimly seen the higher land around Westroosebeke, the extension of the Passchendaele Ridge."

On the 16th August the 11th Battalion Manchester Regiment briefly held this place, but had to fall back. It actually fell three days later at 6.45am on the 19th to a female tank of 1 Tank Brigade and infantry of the 1/8th Worcestershire Regiment - part of an action that was considered to be "the first definite success gained through the use of tanks in the 1917 offensives". To quote Chris McCarthy the place was "harassed by a female tank which ditched 50 yards away (as many as one hundred Germans ran away from this pillbox and the surrounding bunkers and the majority of them were shot down). The strongpoint was occupied and all seven tanks managed to return from the action."

No foul play here!


Cheers

Steve
[/quote]

Edited by seany, 04 September 2011 - 12:14 PM.

[SFayers]

Hi seany,

Not Duck Lodge (too close to Passchendaele), but you're on the right lines using avian terminology!

You're actually much closer with Maison du Hibou - it was fire from Maison du Hibou and other local strong points (particularly Bulow Farm) that caused the 11th Manchesters to abandon this place on the 16th August.

Cheers

Steve