The Lochnagar mine was a mine dug by the Tunnelling Companies of the Royal Engineers under a German field fortification known as Schwabenhöhe, in the front line, south of the village of La Boisselle in the Somme département of France.
The mine was named after Lochnagar Street, the British trench from which the gallery was driven. It formed part of a series of eight large and eleven small mines that were placed beneath the German lines on the British section of the Somme front.
The Lochnagar mine was sprung at 7:28 a.m. on 1 July 1916, the first day of the Battle of the Somme. The crater was captured and held by British troops but the attack on either flank was defeated by German small-arms and artillery fire, except on the extreme right flank and just south of La Boisselle, north of the new crater. The crater has been preserved as a memorial, where a service is held on 1 July each year. (Wikipedia)
The Lochnagar Crater Memorial is privately owned, having been purchased by Richard Dunning on July 1st 1978. It is supported by the Friends of Lochnagar who help maintain it.
Pano of the crater
Another shot of the crater. Unfortunately it's hard to get a sense of scale of how big this hole is. It is almost 91 metres (300 ft)) in diameter and 21 metres (70ft) deep.
This simple memorial is for Private George Nugent. His remains were found on the on 31st October 1998 when a visitor noticed what he thought were human remains emerging from the chalk. The remains were exhumed on Tuesday 3rd November 1998 .
The remains consisted of a human skeleton, the skull of which was broken. Various items of army kit were found with the remains including a rifle, bullets and water bottle, as well as personal items, including a pipe mouthpiece, a silver pen holder and a folding cut throat razor.
It was the razor that held the key to identifying the remains.
Every soldier in the British Army was required to shave daily. Soldiers looked after their razors, and were extremely unlikely to loan it to another soldier. The razor found with the remains, had George's name and service number etched into the handle, so identifying the remains as those of Private George Nugent.
George Nugent was reburied, with military honours, at Ovillers Military Cemetery on 1st July 2000, 84 years after he was killed in battle.(lochnagarcrater.org/)
Memorial to all the nurses who served in WWI
We headed off to follow the route of the Battle of Pozières, fought mainly by the Australians. However we took a wrong turn and ended up at Caterpillar Valley Cemetery. We were going here but the plan was to arrive after following the route of the Battle of Pozières . Oh well :D
On the 6th November 2004, the remains of an unidentified New Zealand soldier were removed from this cemetery and entrusted to New Zealand at a ceremony held at the Longueval Memorial, France. The remains had been exhumed by staff of the Commonwealth War Graves Commission from Plot 14, Row A, Grave 27 and were later laid to rest within the Tomb of the Unknown Warrior, at the National War Memorial, Wellington, New Zealand.
On the east side of the cemetery is the Caterpillar Valley (New Zealand) Memorial, commemorating more than 1,200 officers and men of the New Zealand Division who died in the Battles of the Somme in 1916, and whose graves are not known.
This is one of seven memorials in France and Belgium to those New Zealand soldiers who died on the Western Front and whose graves are not known. The memorials are all in cemeteries chosen as appropriate to the fighting in which the men died.
Both cemetery and memorial were designed by Sir Herbert Baker.
The New Zealand Memorial
Much of the text below is taken From the CWGC Site
Caterpillar Valley was the name given by the army to the long valley which rises eastwards, past "Caterpillar Wood", to the high ground at Guillemont.
The ground was captured, after very fierce fighting, in the latter part of July 1916. It was lost in the German advance of March 1918 and recovered by the 38th (Welsh) Division on 28 August 1918, when a little cemetery was made (now Plot 1 of this cemetery) containing 25 graves of the 38th Division and the 6th Dragoon Guards.
After the Armistice, this cemetery was hugely increased when the graves of more than 5,500 officers and men were brought in from other small cemeteries, and the battlefields of the Somme. The great majority of these soldiers died in the autumn of 1916 and almost all the rest in August or September 1918.
Caterpillar Valley Cemetery now contains 5,569 Commonwealth burials and commemorations of the First World War. 3,796 of the burials are unidentified but there are special memorials to 32 casualties known or believed to be buried among them, and to three buried in McCormick's Post Cemetery whose graves were destroyed by shell fire.
Some views of the Cemetery
On the 6th November 2004, the remains of an unidentified New Zealand soldier were removed from this cemetery and entrusted to New Zealand at a ceremony held at the Longueval Memorial, France. The remains had been exhumed by staff of the Commonwealth War Graves Commission from Plot 14, Row A, Grave 27 and were later laid to rest within the Tomb of the Unknown Warrior, at the National War Memorial, Wellington, New Zealand.
On the east side of the cemetery is the Caterpillar Valley (New Zealand) Memorial, commemorating more than 1,200 officers and men of the New Zealand Division who died in the Battles of the Somme in 1916, and whose graves are not known.
This is one of seven memorials in France and Belgium to those New Zealand soldiers who died on the Western Front and whose graves are not known. The memorials are all in cemeteries chosen as appropriate to the fighting in which the men died.
Both cemetery and memorial were designed by Sir Herbert Baker.
From the Cross of Sacrifice looking towards the memorial.
The New Zealand Memorial
Some of the panels on the memorial.
From the memorial looking back towards the Cross of Sacrifice
Another view looking towards the Memorial
ANZAC's
Just down the road is the Delville Wood South African memorial. Unfortunately we didn't get to this one as we wanted to head back towards Pozières.
And as we left Caterpillar Valley we spotted other cemetery in the middle of the field in the distance. This one is called Thistle Dump Cemetery, High Wood. Everywhere in this area there are places like this, seemingly in the middle of nowhere but each with a story.
High Wood was fiercely fought over during the Battle of the Somme until cleared by 47th (London) Division on 15 September 1916. It was lost during the German advance of April 1918, but retaken the following August.
Thistle Dump Cemetery was begun in August 1916 and used as a front line cemetery until February 1917. It was later increased after the Armistice by the concentration of 56 graves from the Somme battlefields.
There are now 196 Commonwealth servicemen of the First World War buried or commemorated in the cemetery. 59 of the burials are unidentified but there are special memorials to four casualties known to be buried among them. The cemetery also contains seven German war graves. (CWGC.org)
We didn't go here either.. not enough time....
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