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Reillon French national war cemetery

La nécropole nationale de Reillon. © Guillaume Pichard

 

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Established after the fighting in August 1914, the national war cemetery of Reillon contains the bodies of soldiers who were killed in the clashes at Vézouze and the Lorraine front. It also bears witness to the extreme violence of the operations of summer 1914. This remembrance site contains the bodies of 1,324 French soldiers, 370 of which were laid to rest in two ossuaries. Alongside these soldiers are buried two French soldiers killed in June 1940. There are two monuments at this site to honour the memory of those who died in the service of the 223rd and 333rd Infantry Regiments.

The cemetery is adjacent to a German cemetery containing 5,428 bodies, 2,842 from the First World War including 1,873 in an ossuary, and 2,586 soldiers from the Second World War, including 330 in a collective grave.

 

 

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Reillon
À l’est de Lunéville, D 163

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Summary

Eléments remarquables

Monument aux morts des 223e et 333e RI 1914-1918

The Leintrey national cemetery

La nécropole nationale de Leintrey. © ECPAD

 

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Known as the "nécropole des entonnoirs" or shell-hole cemetery, this national military cemetery preserves the memory of French soldiers who died during the night of 10-11 July 1916 when five German mines buried under their trenches exploded. These shell-holes are the most significant remains of the mine war on the Lorraine front.

Nearby a monument was built in memory of Lieutenant Nissim de Camondo (1892-1917) and his observer, Lieutenant Lucien Des Essarts, who were shot down on 5 September 1917 on board their Farman 130 during a photographic mission over Leintrey. Nissim's body was first buried by the Germans at Efringen-Avricourt, then returned in 1919 to rest in the Montmartre cemetery. Devastated by the loss of his son the father, Moïse de Camondo, a rich Jewish banker whose daughter was deported to Auchwitz in 1944, donated his collection of 18th century works of art to France. The Nissim-de-Camondo museum in Paris is therefore testament to the weight of the mourning and affliction of a father overwhelmed by the loss of his son. At Domjevin, an imposing underground surgical ambulance station has been preserved. Dug out between July 1916 and January 1918 this hospital, which contained the latest equipment, was not however put to use.

 

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Leintrey
À l’est de Lunéville, D 19

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Eléments remarquables

Monument commémoratif aux morts du 162e RI

Neufchâteau

Source : pages14-18.mesdiscussions.net

Creation: World War I. Local hospitals.

 

Layout: 1924, 1934, 1935, bodies from the cemeteries in Neufchâteau and the vicinity in the southeast of the Vosges department (Contrexéville, etc.), Maxey-sur-Meuse and de Colombey-les-Belles, in the Meurthe-et-Moselle department were brought together.

1955 to 1962, bodies from World War II were brought together.

 

1961, full renovation.

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88300
Neufchâteau

Summary

Superficie : 6 206 m²
Nombre de corps : Individual graves : 1008
1914-18 : 833 Frenchmen 120 Germans 1 Russian 2 Poles
1939-45 : 47 Frenchmen 5 British

Eléments remarquables

Remarkable elements: 1914-1918, 1939-1945 War Memorial.

The "La Valette" national cemetery in Abreschviller

La nécropole nationale de La Valette. © ECPAD

 

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The La Valette national cemetery brings together the remains of 455 French soldiers, including 372 buried in two ossuaries, who died during the Battle of Sarrebourg in August 1914. It adjoins a German cemetery holding 274 bodies, 70 of whom are in individual graves and 204 in an ossuary. These German soldiers belonged to military units whose garrisons were in Bade, from Bavaria, Wurtemberg, Lorraine and Alsace and the Rhineland.

Created in 1914 following the Battle of Sarrebourg, it was developed in 1925 by bringing together the bodies exhumed from the surrounding areas, in particular Vasperviller, Voyer, Nitting, Landange, Bébing... Nearby, on the forest track between the Biberkirch and Voyer forests, an isolated grave preserves the memory of an officer, second lieutenant Petermann from the 149th infantry regiment (RI). This young graduate of the Saint Cyr military academy had on him a letter in which he expressed his desire to be buried at the spot where he fell.

 

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Abreschviller
Au sud de Sarrebourg, D 44

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Walscheid National Cemetery

La nécropole nationale de Walscheid. © ECPAD

 

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Built in 1914 at the end of the battles fought to the south of the scene of the Battle of Sarrebourg, Walscheid National Cemetery contains the bodies of 404 French soldiers, 345 of whom are buried in two ossuaries. This cemetery was then redeveloped in 1924 and contains primarily the bodies of soldiers from the 21st Army Corps, mainly from the 5th and 6th Colonial Infantry Regiments (CIR).

 

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Walscheid
Au sud-est de Sarrebourg, D 96

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National Necropolis of Plaine-de-Walsch

La nécropole nationale de Plaine-de-Walsch. © ECPAD

 

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The Plaine-de-Walsch National Necropolis contains the bodies of 361 Frenchmen, including 319 who were previously buried in two ossuaries. After the battle of Sarrebourg (August 1914), thousands of bodies were strewn across the battlefield. With the officially recorded loss of 20,000 men, 20 August 1914 remains the deadliest single day of the First World War.

To prevent epidemics, the burial of these victims was of major importance. So, the German army requisitioned all men aged 16 to 60 to act with speed to bring the remains of all those killed in the sector to this cemetery. Without always stopping to identify the bodies, these men collected the fallen and buried them in deep common graves.

In 1924, under the supervision of the French War Graves Department, other bodies from the provisional cemeteries of Schneckenbusch, Troisfontaines, Hommarting, and Niderviller were transferred to this site.

Nearby is a German cemetery containing the remains of 277 German soldiers, most of whom also fell on 20 August 1914.

 

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Plaine-de-Walsch
Au sud-est de Sarrebourg, D 96

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The Brouderdorff national cemetery

La nécropole nationale de Brouderdorff. © Guillaume Pichard

 

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The Brouderdorff national cemetery holds the bodies of 466 Frenchmen, including 390 buried in two ossuaries. Following the Battle of Sarrebourg (August 1914), this cemetery was developed by the German army in order to bring together the remains of soldiers killed in this sector. In 1924, under the control of the French graves authorities, other bodies were transferred here. A large number of these soldiers belonged to the 139th, 121st, 92nd and 16th infantry regiments (RI).

 

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Brouderdorff
Au sud-ouest de Sarrebourg, D 96

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The Sarrebourg national prisoners of war cemetery

La nécropole nationale des prisonniers de guerre de Sarrebourg. © ECPAD

 

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The Sarrebourg national cemetery - which was created in 1922 - underwent alterations until 1926 in order to welcome the bodies of soldiers who died during captivity in Germany between 1914-1918. Buried in temporary cemeteries linked to the internment camps, their bodies were exhumed and then repatriated to Sarrebourg. This national cemetery brings together, in individual graves, 13,389 Frenchmen, of whom 54 lie in two ossuaries.

At the centre of the cemetery, a monument was created by Swiss artist Frédéric-Balthazar Stoll, also known as Frédy Stoll (1869-1949) - a volunteer during the war - whilst he was a prisoner at Graffenwöhr. In 1928, this monument was dismantled then returned to France. In June 1930, it was definitively installed in Sarrebourg. Frédy Stoll sculpted the statue from a granite block, with the help of his comrades. This monument represents a kneeling, desperate warrior, like a beaten Hercules; a symbol of the prisoners' plight. After the war, Frédy Stoll also created the war memorials in Soulac-sur-Mer, Caillac, Le Verdon-sur-Mer in Gironde, Nadaillac in Dordogne and Bessancourt in the Val d'Oise.

Following the armistice of 11 November 1918, the return of the 477,800 French prisoners of war took place very quickly.

Around 25,000 French prisoners died in Germany from their injuries, diseases caught, accidents or ill treatment. The restitution of the bodies of these prisoners who had died in captivity was decided upon in 1922 - at the same time as they were granted the title "Died for France" - thus ensuring that they were regarded as the equals of those soldiers who had fallen at the front.

This is the only cemetery that exists for French prisoners, soldiers or civilians from invaded areas who died in captivity.

 

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Sarrebourg
Sortie ouest de Sarrebourg, D 27

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Eléments remarquables

Monument de la captivité 1914-1918

The Marxberg national necropolis, Sarrebourg

La nécropole nationale Le Marxberg. © Guillaume Pichard

 

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The Marxberg national necropolis mainly contains the remains of soldiers who died for France during the Battle of Sarrebourg in August 1914 or in the town’s hospitals. Created during the First World War by the German army, it was redesigned between 1925 and 1930 to bring together bodies exhumed from other cemeteries in Sarrebourg and the region. In September 1945, the bodies of French service personnel who died during the occupation of the Rhineland were repatriated and today the necropolis contains 1,608 bodies, including 1,119 Frenchmen lying in individual graves. Two ossuaries contain the remains of 315 and 257 soldiers respectively. From the Second World War, the cemetery contains the bodies of 266 Frenchmen, 77 Poles, 69 Yugoslavs, two Bulgarians and one Czech. A monument inside the cemetery honours the memory of soldiers from the Polish army who died in June 1940: “The town of Sarrebourg and Polish veterans in France, to the memory of the Polish army that fought on the land of Lorraine for our freedom in June 1940. Za wolnosc Nasza i Wasza – For our freedom and yours”.

 

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Sarrebourg
À la sortie ouest de Sarrebourg, N 4

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Eléments remarquables

Plaque commémorative "Aux grenadiers polonais de 1940".

The Sarraltroff national cemetery

La nécropole nationale de Sarraltroff. © ECPAD

 

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In August 1914, following the Battle of Sarrebourg, the German army brought together the bodies of the French and German soldiers in one cemetery. At the end of the war, between 1924 and 1925, the French administration developed this site in order to welcome the mortal remains of soldiers who had initially been buried in the region of Sarraltroff and Dolving. Today, close to a German military cemetery, the Sarraltroff national cemetery holds 278 French soldiers, 227 of whom are buried in two ossuaries.

In the village of Sarraltroff, the stele referred to as "The Trench of Death" is a tribute to the French soldiers from the 27th, 29th and 227th infantry regiments (RI) based in Dijon and Autun, who lost 270 men during the French offensive of 19 August 1914. These men today lie in this cemetery.

 

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Sarraltroff
Au nord de Sarrebourg, D 43

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