I'm here in the Flemish city of Ypres (Ieper). And here several ferocious battles took place during the First World War.
In this video I'm gonna talk about the First Battle of Ypres. This marked the end of the war of movement and started
the stalemate. The trench warfare that eventually would claim millions of lives. Keep watching.
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If you're new: my name is Stefan; I'm a Dutch history teacher. I like to cover history.
Preferably I do that on location. Like right now: I'm in the Belgian city of Ypres (Ieper).
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On 4 August German troops crossed the German-Belgian border.
The German Schlieffen Plan was put into action and it was all about speed.
The Germans advanced towards Liège, which was surrended by heavy fortresses.
With their siege howitzers Big Bertha these fortresses were pulverized.
Next was Namur which was soon taken by the same tactics.
The French that wanted to help the Belgians in their defence were halted at the Battle
of Charleroi and the British were stopped at the Battle of Mons after which they retreated.
The Belgians retreated further to Antwerp.
Towards the end of September the Germans laid siege to Antwerp.
The city would hold out for less than two weeks.
That month the so-called Race to the Sea commenced.
The goal was not to reach the sea as soon as possible, the goal of the Germans and the
British & the French was to outflank the enemy.
It led to several severe clashes at Ypres and the Yser.
As a German officer wrote to his parents: “Two days ago, early in the morning, we
were attacked by an immensely superior English force, one brigade and two battalions, and
were turned out of our positions.
The fellows took five guns from us.
It was a tremendous hand-to-hand fight.
How I escaped myself I am not clear.
[…] War is terrible.
We are all hoping that a decisive battle will end the war.”
South of Ypres the British troops pushed back the German Sixth Army and crossed the Lys
River, but made no progress.
North of Ypres the German Fourth Army fought at the Yser River and were halted by the Belgians
who opened the sluice gates inundating the land and creating a water barrier between
them.
Therefore the fighting became concentrated around Ypres itself.
On 19 October 1914 the First Battle of Ypres commensed.
It began as an attack of both sides, but soon the Allies were on the defensive.
British commander John French wanted to retreat from the emerging Ypres Salient but he was overruled by French Commander-in-Chief
Joseph Joffre.
As the British ran out of shells their small-arms took out many German attackers who
attacked in dense masses.
This also had to do with the fact that the British were professional soldiers from the
BEF (British Expeditionary Force) and the German attackers mostly consisted of inexperienced
soldiers
The Allies hid behind farmhouses and began digging trenches.
These initial trenches were very makeshift.
These soon filled with water from the rain.
From 21 till the 30 October the Germans carried out dispersed attacks, but their attacks became
more concentrated from the 31 onwards almost breaking the British lines.
However the British managed to hold their liens. As November passed the German attacks became more sporadic and German commander
Falkenhayn decided to break off the attack due to the lack of progress, the many
cassualties and the lack of heavy artillery shells.
The Allies were still in control of Ypres itself.
Or what was left of it.
The medieval cloth town was smashed by the artillery bombardements. Its iconic buildings were destroyed
As John Keegan wrote:
“Already the magnificent Gothic buildings of the ancient wool town, the Cloth Hall,
the Cathedral, the merchant weavers’ houses, were falling into ruin under the weight of
heavy German artillery fire.
The outlying country, too, was taking on the pockmarked, denuded look that would characterise
its landscape for years to come.”
The battle was indeed a bitter foretaste of what was to come.
It ended the war of movement and started the stalemat: trench warfare that eventually would
claim millions of lives.
This battle, the First Battle of Ypres, claimed tens of thousand of lives.
Here is David Stevenson with some numbers.
“For these results they paid a heavy price: in the battle of the Yser the Belgians suffered
20,000 casualties, or 35 per cent of their remaining army; the French (who held the line
running north from the salient to the inundations and whose role in saving Ypres has been neglected)
lost 50,000, and the BEF 58,000, against German casualties of 130,000.”
Near Langemarck 25,000 young German soldiers perished which was dubbed ‘Kindermord bei
Ypern’ or the Massacre of the Innocents at Ypres.
Did you know that Adolf Hitler saw action in this region here as well?
And the First Battle of Ypres was fought on such a large scale that the fighting didn't
only take place in this city.
The battles of Langemarck, Gheluvelt and Nonne Bosschen are part of this one as well.
Official historians mark 22 November as the official “end” of the First Battle of
Ypres, but in reality the fighting continued as a stalemate set in.
As the Germans switched their focus more on the Eastern Front, German commander Falkenhayn
ordered his western forces to expand and deepen the makeshift trenches creating a system of
several lines.
He saw this as a temporary solution, so he could release troops for mobile operations
elsewhere.
More battles for Ypres would take place during this war.
On 22 April 1915 the Second Battle of Ypres began with a German offensive.
During this battle the Germans used poison gas.
On 31 July 1917 the British attacked opening the Third Battle of Ypres (Passchendaele).
In 1918 two more battles took place in this region.
In short: there is much more to cover.