Battlefields Trip

40 pupils spent a poignant long weekend exploring significant historical sites in Belgium and France.

Year 9 embarked on a memorable three-day trip, visiting trenches, cemeteries and museums to remember those who lost their lives during the First World War. The trip was once again led by Robert, who has guided our Battlefields trips for 25 years. The first stop was the Pool of Peace, with blossoming white waterlilies. It was not, however, a natural beauty spot but the remains of a huge explosion detonated under the German lines as part of the battle for Ypres: a beautiful but sombre introduction to the battlefields of the Western Front.

The group visited British, French and German cemeteries – the difference between them was stark. The British decided that all should be buried together (rich, poor, Christian, Muslim, Jewish); pupils learned about those who died for their country, from 14 year olds who lied about their age, to those who were 72 years old. Adding to the poignancy, pupils and teachers read poems beside the graves. The French cemeteries had rows of crosses, strictly arranged by rank, whilst the German cemetery at Langemark had flat, black markers on graves and a huge mass grave. The day ended watching the Last Post at the Menin Gate in Ypres.

On the following day the group visited the Somme, to battlefields where there were 57,000 British casualties on the first day (1st July 1916); they made their way through trenches, visiting museums and many cemeteries. On the third day, the group spent time in Passchendaele and Ypres with a much needed trip to a Belgian chocolate shop.

The trip was intense, moving and deeply interesting, with sadly modern resonances with Ukraine today.