I recently visited Tyne Cot Cemetery, the largest Commonwealth War Graves Commission burial ground for the dead of the First World War in the Ypres Salient on the Western Front, where this 1923 map planning the plots for reburials can be found.
Situated around 9 km from Ypres on a strategic ridge above the town of Passchendale, it contains the graves of 11,961 Commonwealth servicemen, over 8000 of which are unidentified and commemorates nearly 35,000 named in a memorial at the top end of the cemetery.
Photos taken at ground level such as mine above, do not really encompass the sheer scale of the site which only an aerial view such as the one below can convey (Source: Commonwealth War Graves Commission).
In the fields around this area, over 20 times this many Commonwealth service men were killed, wounded or missing in the Third Battle of Ypres alone, with a similar number of German losses – a sobering thought, whilst we remember today all those who have gave up their lives so that we can continue to live ours in freedom.
