Bart Debeer

A mission that we continue if only to honour him.

🚨The @chinookjustice.bsky.social petition calling for a public inquiry now has over 40,000 signatures.

Are you listening Prime Minister? You promised transparency and accountability in public office. Please now deliver on that

Please keep signing everyone
www.change.org/p/justice-fo...

It's been too long. Back where it all started for me 20 years ago. People who now this affliction might consider to join @thegreatwargroup.bsky.social

Such a shame Dave isn't here any longer to provide more useful insight. I miss you, man.

A closer view of the German bunker near the Dodengang. Even though well over a century has passed, it is clear this place took a lot of hits from the Belgians. - Dodengang / Trenches of Death Diksmuide, Belgium 🇧🇪

A closer view of the German bunker near the Dodengang. Even though well over a century has passed, it is clear this place took a lot of hits from the Belgians. - Dodengang / Trenches of Death Diksmuide, Belgium 🇧🇪

A closer view of the German bunker near the Dodengang.

Even though well over a century has passed, it is clear this place took a lot of hits from the Belgians.

W/ my bud @bartdebeer.bsky.social

- Dodengang / Trenches of Death
Diksmuide, Belgium 🇧🇪

Looking from the Belgian bunker across the former No Man’s Land to the German bunker just a few dozen meters away. During the Great War the area where the two men were walking was a giant crater, blown by the Belgians to stop German raids.

Looking from Belgian bunker across the former No Man’s Land to the German bunker just a few dozen meters away.

During the Great War the area where the two men were walking was a giant crater, blown by the Belgians to stop German raids.

W/ @bartdebeer.bsky.social

- Dodengang / Trenches of Death

An area that could serve as a kill zone for Belgian troops if the Germans seized the structure in this photo. - Dodengang / Trenches of Death Diksmuide, Belgium 🇧🇪

An area that could serve as a kill zone for Belgian troops if the Germans seized the structure in this photo.

- Dodengang / Trenches of Death
Diksmuide, Belgium 🇧🇪

With @bartdebeer.bsky.social

Crude plaques left by Belgian units who served in the Trench of Death. - Dodengang / Trenches of Death Diksmuide, Belgium 🇧🇪

Crude plaques left by Belgian units who served in the Trench of Death. - Dodengang / Trenches of Death Diksmuide, Belgium 🇧🇪

Crude plaques left by Belgian units who served in the Trench of Death.

- Dodengang / Trenches of Death
Diksmuide, Belgium 🇧🇪

Inside a Belgian bunker at the very forward edge of the Trenches of Death.

Inside a Belgian bunker at the very forward edge of the Trenches of Death.

Anyone want to guess what the three shafts are for? Comment below.

- Dodengang / Trenches of Death
Diksmuide, Belgium 🇧🇪

😮

Belgian graffiti engraved on a bunker facing the German forward positions.

Belgian graffiti engraved on a bunker facing the German forward positions.

- Dodengang / Trenches of Death
Diksmuide, Belgium 🇧🇪

YouTube video by 315e RI How to stop ‘butchering’ the pronoucation of 14 French WWI Generals 🇫🇷 in 60 seconds!

@ri315e.bsky.social this is FANTASTIC.

Listen, and listen again:

youtube.com/shorts/niGmo...

The Trenches of Death, snaking right along the bank of the River IJzer. In these photos Bart and I are heading from the Belgian rear area towards the German lines.

- Dodengang / Trenches of Death
Diksmuide, Belgium 🇧🇪

My buddy Bart walking through the Belgian trenches in the Dodengang / Trench of Death.

These are the last Belgian trenches of the Great War, and while they’ve been preserved in concrete and have a fairly clean appearance you still get the feeling of what it was like to man this very forward position in the front line.

The floor of the museum by the Trench of Death is a map of the front line as it was during the Great War.

The floor of the museum by the Trench of Death is a map of the front line as it was during the Great War.

The floor of the museum by the Trench of Death is a map of the front line as it was during the Great War.

This photo shows the actual Belgian trenches, which are the only surviving ones left to visit.

The floor of the museum by the Trench of Death is a map of the front line as it was during the Great War.

The last photo shows the actual Belgian trenches, which are the only surviving ones left to visit.

- Dodengang / Trench of Death
Diksmuide, Belgium 🇧🇪

Belgian WW1 Adrian-pattern helmet showing the entry and exit point of a bullet that passed through it. It is unknown if someone was wearing it at the time.

Belgian WW1 Adrian-pattern helmet showing the entry and exit point of a bullet that passed through it. It is unknown if someone was wearing it at the time.

Right down the street from the Petroleum Tanks shown in the previous post is the Belgian Dodengang, or the Trench of Death.

This Belgian helmet right here gives an idea of why the place was so named.

- Dodengang / Trench of Death
Diksmuide, Belgium 🇧🇪

We did make a detour… In honour of the first Frenchman killed on Belgian soil in #WW1. Poor chap was part of General Sordet’s Magical Mystery Tour, & died 111 years ago today. This French cavalry corps ambled round Belgium exhausting men & horses alike for no real gain in the first weeks of the war

An artistic recreation of the Petroleum Tanks that were a focus of the fighting between the Belgians and Germans in this sector of the IJzer front.

At first I took this to be a modern-art inspired climbing structure for kids (thus betraying my working class Boston roots: “It’s wicked ahtsy lookin’, y’know?”).

The Other Seven of Faubourg-Pavé | Battles of the First World War Podcast Get more from Battles of the First World War Podcast on Patreon

New post up on Patreon for Patreon peeps:

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Monuments and a demarcation stone around and near the memorial chapel in Stuivekenskerke.

- Stuivekenskerke, Belgium

Old Stuivekenskerke, a tiny hamlet just now returning to life after the Great War. This is the road leading into the hamlet. The bunker structure is the remains of Stuivekenskerke’s very tall-towered chapel, which became an observation post on the IJzer Front during the Great War. - Stuivekenskerke, Belgium

Old Stuivekenskerke, a tiny hamlet just now returning to life after the Great War. This is a photo of the church remains and its observation deck. The bunker structure is the remains of Stuivekenskerke’s very tall-towered chapel, which became an observation post on the IJzer Front during the Great War. - Stuivekenskerke, Belgium

Old Stuivekenskerke, a tiny hamlet just now returning to life after the Great War. This is an aerial photo of the sector during the war. The bunker structure is the remains of Stuivekenskerke’s very tall-towered chapel, which became an observation post on the IJzer Front during the Great War. - Stuivekenskerke, Belgium

Old Stuivekenskerke, a tiny hamlet just now returning to life after the Great War. These are wartime photos from the hamlet. The bunker structure is the remains of Stuivekenskerke’s very tall-towered chapel, which became an observation post on the IJzer Front during the Great War. - Stuivekenskerke, Belgium

Old Stuivekenskerke, a tiny hamlet just now returning to life after the Great War.

The bunker structure is the remains of Stuivekenskerke’s very tall-towered chapel, which became an observation post on the IJzer Front during the Great War.

- Stuivekenskerke, Belgium

Commemorative plaque in Ramskapelle, Belgium remembering:

Ramskapelle’s old rail station, along what used to be the rail line and thus the front line on the IJzer front. Its ruins were fortified into a bunker by the defending Belgians. Then photo being held up by my friend Bart.

Ramskapelle’s old rail station, along what used to be the rail line and thus the front line on the IJzer front. Its ruins were fortified into a bunker by the defending Belgians. This photo shows the bunker built into the building ruins by the Belgian Army. Then photo being held up by my friend Bart.

Ramskapelle’s old rail station, along what used to be the rail line and thus the front line on the IJzer front. Its ruins were fortified into a bunker by the defending Belgians.

Then photo being held up by my friend Bart.

- Ramskapelle, Belgium

Perhaps somewhere in the more than 400 unknown burials in Ramskapelle Military Cemetery lie the remains of Georges Spellier. A soldier in the Belgian 5th Line Regiment, Georges was killed on 31 October 1914 in the mud of the River IJzer. He may have been buried here as one of the unknowns. Georges Spellier was 16 when he was killed. Ramskapelle Belgian Military Cemetery

Perhaps somewhere in the more than 400 unknown burials in Ramskapelle Military Cemetery lie the remains of Georges Spellier. A soldier in the Belgian 5th Line Regiment, Georges was killed on 31 October 1914 in the mud of the River IJzer. He may have been buried here as one of the unknowns.

The King Albert Memorial built by Belgian veterans of the Great War to honor their beloved king, Le Roi Chevalier (The Knight King).

The memorial is located right next to the IJzer River locks, which the Belgians opened in order to flood the IJzer (Yser) front for the next four years.

The bricks of the King Albert Memorial are made from IJzer clay, with mud taken from the various sectors of the Belgian part of the Western Front. The mud was extracted in the 1930s, and veterans could claim that the blood of Belgian heroes was in that mud and thus, in the bricks and the memorial.

A lire. Le voyage au bout de la nuit d'Alphonse Touchet Philippe Morand publie les souvenirs de la Première Guerre mondiale et son grand-oncle Alphonse Touchet.

#1GM #Indre1418 Une surprise de pré-rentrée. Un nouveau témoignage d'un classe 1912 de l'Indre au 95e (entre autres): Alphonse Touchet. Bonne nouvelle, l'auteur dit qu'il s'est contenté de transcrire au mieux le journal d'origine A vérifier, lecture à venir.
www.echoduberry.fr/actualite-26...

A demarcation stone at the Dodengang, signaling this was as far as the invaders made it before being stopped.

In the background, my incredibly knowledgeable good friend @bartdebeer.bsky.social

The second marker is a memorial to the Trench of Death.

- Dodengang / Trenches of Death

Risky, but let’s try this. 1 like = 1 opinion on the First World War which might be unorthodox.