The Bluff, Ypres

The Bluff is a wooded ridge along the Ypres–Comines Canal south-east of Ypres in the Flemish province of West-Vlaanderen in Belgium. It is 0.75 miles (1.2 km) south of Hill 60 and 1.5 miles (2.4 km) east of St. Eloi, about halfway in between Voormezele and Hollebeke. The area was merged into Zillebeke in 1970 and into Ypres in 1976.

History

Map showing The Bluff south-east of Ypres, between St. Eloi and Hill 60 and the Ypres Salient in June 1916.

In World War I, like other parts of the Ypres Salient, the area known to the British as The Bluff and to the Germans as Grosse Bastion or Kanal Bastion was the site of Battles of Ypres between German and Allied forces. The Bluff is an artificial hill in the landscape, created by spoil from the Ypres–Comines Canal, which at this point is 120 feet (37 m) wide, in a cutting with the spoil on terraces either side. In 1916 the canal passed through the British lines at a right-angle, full of water and the north bank ended in the hill, about 30 feet (9.1 m) high, just inside the British front line. Elevated in an otherwise flat landscape, The Bluff was one of the best vantage points in the Ypres Salient which made it an important military objective. No man's land was about 150 yards (140 m) wide close to the canal but tapered and about 400 yards (370 m) to the north was about 40 yards (37 m) wide, opposite a German salient called The Bean by the British and Der Helm by the Germans.[1] In the spring of 1915, there was constant underground fighting in the Ypres Salient at Hooge, Hill 60, Railway Wood, Sanctuary Wood, St Eloi and The Bluff which required the deployment of new drafts of tunnellers for several months after the formation of the first eight tunnelling companies of the Royal Engineers.[2]

The German 27th (Württemberg) Division captured The Bluff in a local operation on 14 February 1916 and then lost it to a counter-attack by the 14th (Light) Division on 2 March. In July, the Germans detonated a mine under the ridge but did not capture it.[3] The Bluff continued to be the site of considerable mining and tunnel warfare, carried out on the Allied side by various Tunnelling companies of the Royal Engineers. On 11 December, the area was considered safe from German mining, after a prisoner had drawn a map of the German mine workings. The British dug a deep mining system under the German galleries and blew several big camouflets behind the German lines; the German galleries were captured and incorporated into the British shallow gallery system.[4] On 7 June 1917, the Germans were driven back from the area during the Battle of Messines Ridge.[5] The Germans re-took The Bluff during the Spring Offensive of 1918 and it changed hands for the last time on 28 September 1918, after an attack by the 14th (Light) Division.[6]

Commemoration

There are three Commonwealth War Graves Commission (CWGC) war cemeteries in the area. The area is now a provincial nature reserve and picnic area called "Provinciaal Domein Palingbeek".[7]

See also

Footnotes

  1. ↑ Edmonds 1993, p. 164.
  2. ↑ Barton, Doyle & Vanderwalle 2005, p. 165.
  3. ↑ GWFF 2008.
  4. ↑ Edmonds 1993, pp. 162–163, 169–172.
  5. ↑ Edmonds 1993, p. 172.
  6. ↑ Edmonds 1995, pp. 204–209.
  7. ↑ "Palingbeek" (in Dutch). Provincie West-Vlaanderen. Archived from the original on 2007-12-17. Retrieved 2008-05-05.

References

  • Barton, Peter; Doyle, Peter; Vanderwalle, Johan (2005). Beneath Flanders Fields: The Tunnellers' War 1914–1918. Staplehurst: Spellmount. ISBN 978-1862272378. 
  • Edmonds, J. E. (1993) [1932]. Military Operations France and Belgium, 1916: Sir Douglas Haig's Command to the 1st July: Battle of the Somme. History of the Great War Based on Official Documents by Direction of the Historical Section of the Committee of Imperial Defence I (Imperial War Museum & Battery Press ed.). London: Macmillan. ISBN 0-89839-185-7. 
  • Edmonds, J. E. (1995) [1937]. Military Operations France and Belgium: 1918 March–April: Continuation of the German Offensives. History of the Great War Based on Official Documents by Direction of the Historical Section of the Committee of Imperial Defence II (Imperial War Museum & Battery Press ed.). London: Macmillan. ISBN 0-89839-223-3. 
  • Edmonds, J. E. (1993) [1947]. Military Operations France and Belgium 1918: 8th August – 26th September: The Franco-British Offensive. History of the Great War Based on Official Documents by Direction of the Historical Section of the Committee of Imperial Defence IV (Imperial War Museum & Battery Press ed.). London: HMSO. ISBN 0-89839-191-1. 
  • Van de Vijver, Sander. "Wereldoorlog I in de Westhoek" [World War I in Westhoek]. The Great War in Flanders Fields. Retrieved 5 May 2008. 

Further reading

Coordinates: 50°48′50″N 2°55′28″E / 50.8139°N 2.9244°E / 50.8139; 2.9244

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