Keep the Home Fires Burning

Saturday 4th May 2013

The names of the dead ring out.

Walking towards the relatively new visitor centre at the Tyne Cot Cemetery the names of the dead can be heard spoken out loud as you walk along the path to the entrance. Once inside the visitor centre the names continue at a respectful pace, an eerie reminder of where you are.

We absorbed the information the visitor centre had to offer, things to read, videos to watch. Some familiar, some new, but all relevant.

When visiting a cemetery that is the resting place for nearly 12000 soldiers and a memorial to an additional 34000 soldiers, I feel you can not truly appreciate it without knowing about all the events that led to them to be there.

Stepping out of the visitor centre we followed the path down the side of the cemetery and headed to the main entrance. Our first sight of the cemetery, the sideways view of rows and rows of gravestones.




Finally we reach the entrance.




Excuse me for stating the obvious but there are a lot of grave stones at Tyne Cot. As we enter the cemetery this becomes very obvious. The grave stones all stand together in seemingly perfect geometrical alignment, playing tricks on the eyes like an optical illusion, but this is no illusion. Each stone and each name inscribed on the walls represents a soul who lost their life in a conflict I find harder and harder to understand.





Several German bunkers sit here, relics of the conflict, guarded by trees.




We take a closer look at the grave stones. Many graves identify people by name, others do not.

Some of the graves have no name.	Some of the graves have a regiment but still no name.

The graves are maintained with such care. The grass is cut, the edges trimmed. Flowers are planted. Grave stones that are old and worn are repaired. The Commonwealth War Graves Commission does an incredible job.

The stones not only name the soldiers and regiments, they also include the emblem of the regiments.

These are some of the emblems we saw:



We approach what I now know is called the Cross of Sacrifice and turn around to once more survey the full extent of the cemetery. It is a lot to take in.





The Memorial to Missing lies beyond. A wall made up of panels inscribed with the names of missing soldiers, an imposing sight curving around the back of the cemetery.

 

We walk up the length of the wall and pay our respects. It is the least we can do, before finally departing.

The next stop is the 20^th Light Division memorial in Langemark, another place my grandfather had been.

To be continued...