Search results
Results From The WOW.Com Content Network
The Battle of the Somme (French: Bataille de la Somme; German: Schlacht an der Somme), also known as the Somme offensive, was a major battle of the First World War fought by the armies of the British Empire and the French Third Republic against the German Empire.
The Somme (UK: / s ɒ m / SOM, US: / s ʌ m / SUM; [1] [2] French: ⓘ) is a river in Picardy, northern France. The river is 245 km (152 mi) in length, from its source in the high ground of the former Arrouaise Forest [ fr ] at Fonsomme near Saint-Quentin , to the Bay of the Somme , in the English Channel .
As the highest point on the 1916 Somme battlefield, the town was a vital objective – whichever side controlled it would have unimpeded views of much of the enemy front. The Allies expected to capture the town (and beyond) on 1 July 1916, the first day of the Battle of the Somme, but three weeks later it was still firmly in German hands.
You are free: to share – to copy, distribute and transmit the work; to remix – to adapt the work; Under the following conditions: attribution – You must give appropriate credit, provide a link to the license, and indicate if changes were made.
Map of the Battle of the Somme, with Ovillers and La Boisselle almost in the centre At the start of the Battle of Albert (1–13 July), the name given by the British to the first two weeks of the Battle of the Somme , the ruined villages of Ovillers and La Boisselle found themselves at the very epicentre of events, with the D 929 Albert ...
The Ancre river flows west to Hamel then turns south through a valley past Miraumont, Grandcourt, Beaucourt-sur-l'Ancre and St Pierre Divion.On the north side of the river, the Auchonville Spur (with a lower feature called Hawthorn Ridge) and Beaucourt Spur, which descends from Colincamps and Grandcourt Spur, with the village of Serre-lès-Puisieux (Serre) on its summit to the north, point ...
John Masefield also visited the Somme, while preparing The Old Front Line (1917), in which he also described the area around the crater as dazzlingly white and painful to look at. [22] After the war the Café de la Grande Mine was built nearby; after the Second World War, many of the smaller craters were filled but the Lochnagar mine crater ...
The Battle of the Somme was the regiment's first major engagement, and during an assault that lasted approximately 30 minutes the regiment was all but wiped out. Purchased in 1921 by the people of Newfoundland, the memorial site is the largest battalion memorial on the Western Front , and the largest area of the Somme battlefield that has been ...