In his collection of short stories, Solitude de la pitié (“The Solitude of Compassion”), Jean Giono evokes his friend Yvan Kossiakoff, who lies in this national cemetery (tomb 372). According to him, this fighter was shot in July 1917 at the Chalons camp. But there is no evidence that any Russian soldiers were executed at that time. In all likelihood, Jean Giono imagined this execution with reference to the Russian uprising in La Courtine (Creuse).

On 16 May 1937, the French Front Veteran Officers Association, founded in 1923, together with Veterans of the Moroccan Division, opened a memorial chapel dedicated to the 4,000 Russian soldiers who died in France and Salonika (now Thessaloniki). The chapel, designed in Orthodox style by architect Albert Benoît, was built near the cemetery, which also houses a monument in homage to the Russian infantry of the Second Special Regiment.

This cemetery is located beside the N44 towards Berry-au-Bac at La Musette. Of the 564 bodies in the cemetery (563 British and 1 from New Zealand, and additionally a British pilot and a French soldier from the Second World War), 413 have not been identified. The cemetery was constructed after the Armistice by bringing together the graves, isolated or in small cemeteries, of soldiers killed in 1918.

The village of La Ville-au-Bois was captured in April 1917 by French troops during the bloody Chemin des Dames offensive. The sector was held by the British 50th Division on 27 May 1918 when the Germans launched their third spring offensive, which brought them to Château-Thierry. During the battle, the 2nd Devons and the 5th battery of the 45th Brigade of the Royal Field Artillery were wiped out and received the Military Cross for their sacrifices.

Vailly-sur-Aisne national cemetery is located beside the D925 road, adjoining a British cemetery. On the site rest mainly the bodies of soldiers who fell in the Chemin des Dames area. Due to its location next to a first aid post, it was used as a cemetery as early as 1917, following the Nivelle offensive. Work was carried out on the cemetery between 1922 and 1925 in connection with projects to bring together bodies buried at Nanteuil-la-Fosse, Jouy, Allemant, Laffaux and Bois-Morin.

The cemetery covers an area of 9,141m² and is located 13km east of Soissons and 18km south of Laon. It brings together the bodies of 1,576 French service personnel, including 17 from the Second World War, in individual and grouped graves.

There are two monuments on the site. One of them, erected by the National Union of Veterans of Vailly-sur-Aisne, is dedicated to "the memory of our comrades who died for France". The other was built in homage to Félix Germain Jacquinot of the 120th infantry battalion who died for France on 8 July 1917 and to the memory of his comrades, all of whom lie in the cemetery: "Jacquinot Félix Germain, born in Villery (Aube) on 15 June 1895, awarded the Military Cross, sergeant in the 120th infantry battalion, 3rd company, killed at Chemin des Dames (Panthéon battle) on 8 July 1917".

British Cemetery

Moving towards the Marne front, the British 3rd division crossed the Aisne River at the village of Vailly-sur-Aisne on 12 September 1914.

The village had fallen under German control in 1915, despite determined allied resistance. It was taken back at the start of the Nivelle offensive in the Chemin des Dames area on 18 April 1917. It was lost again in June 1918 during the imperial counter-offensive, and freed on 15 September 1918. Due to the heavy price paid from the time hostilities began, once the war was over the British decided to site a military cemetery at Vailly-sur-Aisne, close to the French national cemetery.

Most of the service personnel buried on the site were killed in September 1914, while a few others gave their lives for freedom in 1918. There are 677 bodies: 674 British, 1 Canadian, 1 German and 1 French. To date, 328 graves remain anonymous. The Vailly-sur-Aisne British cemetery is run by the Commonwealth War Graves Commission.

Direction interdépartementale (D.I.)

Chef du secteur Nord-Pas de Calais

Cité administrative

Rue de Tournai 59045 Lille Cedex

Tel: +33.(0)3.20.62.12.39 Fax: +33.(0)3.20.62.12.30

Email: diracmetz@wanadoo.fr

Site : www.cwgc.org

A headstone was erected a few kilometres form the Berry-au-Bac cemetery, in memory of the poet Guillaume Apollinaire, who was injured by shrapnel on 17 March 1916 in the Bois des Buttes.  He was trepanned on 9 May 1916, and died on 9 November 1918 from the Spanish Influenza Epidemic. He is recognised to have “died of his wounds for France”.

The grounds of the psychiatric hospital in Cadillac-sur-Garonne, a bastide founded in the 13^th century with the support of the King of England, received 98 World War One veterans with facial and brain injuries.

Its old cemetery keeps their memory alive... Among the belligerent countries involved in WWI, France and Germany mobilised the largest number of men of fighting age: 80% of all men between the ages of fifteen and forty-nine.

Once the armistice had been signed, alongside the families of the 1,375,800 dead and missing, the country had to take care of 4,266,000 injured veterans, of which there were ten to fifteen thousand with facial injuries, called “Gueules Cassées”, a term that originated with Colonel Yves Picot, founder of the Union des Blessés de la Face (Union of Facial Injury Victims). Victims of the brutality of the first industrial conflict, during which 70% of injuries were caused by incessant artillery fire, these men were desocialised by the war. They had to re-learn civilian life, deal with their handicaps, and live under the eyes of a nation embarrassed by these heroes who did not “Die for France”, a reflection of the country’s condition at the end of the war.

To the north-east of the bastide of Cadillac, in the Gironde department, the “brain injuries” section at the psychiatric hospital contains the graves of 98 injured veterans who came back from the front mentally ruined and were put here to live out the rest their lives, as at the establishment in Moussy-le-Vieux (Seine-et-Marne) and Coudon (Var).

These men were doubly forgotten after their deaths because, as they were patients at the psychiatric hospital, their deaths were not recorded by a municipal officer. Their tombs and their identification markers, many of which have fallen off, are now anonymous.

Two plaques were presented, however, in 1937 and 1956 by veterans from the Gironde department at the initiative of the Saint-Blaise Association in Cadillac, honouring “the memory of their comrades, victims of brain injuries in the War of 1914-1918”.

Website: Mémoire des hommes

Memory traces La Meuse was no stranger to the battles of the First World War. Our "sad souls" are Verdun, the Argonne, Les Eparges, the St Mihiel Salient... taking the time to discover them and understand them means that the memory of all the men that died here will live on. As the years pass, this duty to remember has become a duty to recount what happened. The Saint-Mihiel Salient forms in September 1914, and the French try to shrink its size in the years that follow. Violent battles, originally above ground but then in the mines, take place in Les Eparges, the ridge that marked the northwest border of the Salient. The French lead an assault on Les Eparges on 17th February 1915, hoping to reduce the size of the St Mihiel Salient. German counter-attacks follow immediately afterwards, and the Germans take back the land. Bitter battles follow, both above ground and, more often, in the mines. On 9th and 10th April 1915, a battalion of the Eighth Infantry Regiment takes the eastern spur of Les Epargnes (Point X). But the battles have only just begun: on 24th April 1915, von Stanz launches an attack on Les Epargnes from the Calonne trench. To the west of the battlefield, the village remains French. But it comes under the fire of the enemy's top marksmen, and little by little it falls.The ridge itself is destroyed by mines; the craters stretch from point C to point X, and both are marked with a monument. The battles continue in the months that follow, and are sometimes more intense, sometimes less so. Les Eparges is not liberated until September 1918, when the first American troops to arrive take back the Salient for the French. By 14 September 1918, the Americans have reached Fresnes-en-Woëvre : Les Eparges is no longer in German hands.

Trottoir National Necropolis Stretching below the celebrated mound, this necropolis extends against a background of fir trees. It holds 2108 tombs, including ten Muslim steles, and an ossuary housing 852 bodies. The cemetery, which was built during the war, the remains of the soldiers killed in the forest and at Marquanterre. It was entirely renovated in 1958.
106th Infantry Regiment Monument If the visitor follows the path to the top of the hill, he or she will come across a monument at the top of the stairs, set against the trees. This work, by sculptor Maxime Real Del Sarte, was built to commemorate the glory of the "Ghosts of the 106th Infantry Regiment." It looks like an irregular pyramid topped with a human head. Severed hands, skulls and crosses evoke the suffering of all those who fought on these bloody slopes. A bronze bas-relief on the front shows a woman wearing a helmet, in a pose reminiscient of the classical Pieta.
Engineers' Memorial Right at the top, the visitor will find a monument to the memory of the military engineers who suffered great losses during the mine war. A semi-circular double wall stretches behind seven concrete sheet piles. On one side is the dedication, on the other the symbol of engineering.
Monument at Point X At the far eastern of the ridge, where it dominates the Woëvre plain for more than 100m, is a monument placed at the end of a short esplanade. The wall surfaces that form it slope sharply, and it is topped with a triangular fronton. A cross above an altar is engraved on one face; on the other is a bas-relief in which a bare-headed officer leads his men into battle. This fine piece, by the sculptor Fischer, is dedicated "à ceux qui n'ont pas de tombe" (to those without a grave). Signs and benches add the finishing touches.
302nd Infantry Regiment Monument Next to the Monument at Point X, on the cusp of a crater, is a little stone wall bearing a plaque adorned with a croix de guerre and a plaque that reads: "302e R.I. 20 Septembre 1914, 21 Mars 1915. Les Anciens des 302e et 102e R.I." (302nd Infantry Regiment 20 September 1914, 20 March 1915. Veterans of the 302nd and 102nd Infantry Regiments).
Les Eparges is always open, and entrance is free. Informative panels help you better understand the site's history, and there is a marked pathway managed by the ONF and Association Nationale du Souvenir de la Bataille de Verdun et de ses Hauts-Lieux. Following this pathway allows you to walk in the footsteps of the soldiers who fought here. Groups and tours available upon reservation. Contact Pays d'Accueil Touristique des Côtes de Meuse Place Taylord 55210 Vigneulles-les-Hattonchatel Tel-fax: 03 29 90 08 55 Tel-fax: 03 29 90 04 29 Tourist Office Tel: 00 33 (0)3 29 86 14 18 Regional Tourism Board Tel: 00 33 (0)3 29 45 78 40