Saint-Hilaire-le-Grand is a small village in the Marne department in north-eastern France. The France-Russian Military cemetery is located between St. Hilaire-le-Grand and Mourmelon-le-Grand on the D21.

The cemetery is located in an area known as "L'Espérance", near the French military camp at Mourmelon, and was erected in memory of 4,000 Russian Expeditionary Force (REF) soldiers killed on the battlefields of Champagne fighting alongside the French and British armies.

Their brigades occupied the Fort de la Pompelle near Reims and sustained heavy losses in the Nivelle offensive. Disbanded when the Russian Revolution broke out in October 1917, the officers, with some volunteers from the ranks, formed a "Légion russe d'honneur" and continued to fight until the end of the war, wearing French uniforms and being absorbed into the Moroccan Regiment.

In honour of their fallen, the survivors opened this Russian cemetery and later added a chapel, built in the Russian Orthodox style.

GPS: 49°09'29.7"N 4°23'59.7"E

The Douaumont Ossuary (French: Ossuaire de Douaumont) is a memorial containing the skeletal remains of soldiers who died on the battlefield during the Battle of Verdun in World War 1. It is located in Douaumont-Vaux, France, within the Verdun battlefield, and immediately next to the Fleury-devant-Douaumont National Necropolis. It was built on the initiative of Charles Ginisty, Bishop of Verdun.

During the 300 days of the Battle of Verdun (21 February 1916 – 19 December 1916) approximately 230,000 men died out of a total of 700,000 casualties (dead, wounded and missing). The battle became known in German as Die Hölle von Verdun (English: The Hell of Verdun), or in French as L'Enfer de Verdun, and was conducted on a battlefield covering less than 20 square kilometers (7.7 sq mi)

The ossuary is a memorial containing the remains of both French and German soldiers who died on the Verdun battlefield. Through small outside windows, the skeletal remains of at least 130,000 unidentified combatants of both nations can be seen filling up alcoves at the lower edge of the building. On the inside of the ossuary building, the ceiling and walls are partly covered by plaques bearing names of French soldiers who died during the Battle of Verdun. A few of the names are from fighting that took place in the area during World War II, as well as for veterans of the Indochina and Algerian Wars. The families of the soldiers that are recognized here by name contributed for those individual plaques. In front of the monument, and sloping downhill, lies the largest single French military cemetery of the First World War with 16,142 graves. It was inaugurated in 1923 by Verdun veteran André Maginot, who would later approve work on the Maginot Line.

The ossuary was officially inaugurated on 7 August 1932 by French President Albert Lebrun.

GPS: 49°12'29.1"N 5°25'25.9"E

Reference https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Douaumont_Ossuary

The World War 1 St. Mihiel American Cemetery and Memorial is located at the west edge of Thiaucourt (Meurthe-et-Moselle), France.

The 40.5 acres (16.4 ha) cemetery contains the graves of 4,153 American military dead from World War 1. The majority of these died in the Battle of Saint-Mihiel, an offensive that resulted in the reduction of the St. Mihiel salient that threatened Paris.

On two walls of the museum are 284 names engraved of the missing.

The cemetery is open daily to the public from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., except December 25 and January 1.
When the cemetery is open to the public, a staff member is on duty in the visitor building to answer questions and escort relatives to grave and memorial sites.

GPS: 48°57'24.5"N 5°51'08.3"E

The World War 1 Montsec American Monument is located on the isolated hill of Montsec (Thiaucourt), France, 12 miles southwest of St. Mihiel American Cemetery and 10 miles east of the town of St. Mihiel.

The monument was designed by Egerton Swartwout and built by the American Battle Monuments Commission in 1932. It was dedicated in 1937. This monument commemorates the large attack of American and French troops on the St. Mihiel salient at the end of the World War 1. The monument was damaged in the Second World War by American artillery and restored in 1948.

GPS: 48°53'21.8"N 5°42'45.7"E

The World War I Montfaucon American Monument is located seven miles south of the Meuse-Argonne American Cemetery and Memorial and 20 miles northwest of Verdun, France.

The monument commemorates "the brilliant victory of the American First Army in the Meuse-Argonne offensive, September 26 – November 11, 1918, and pays tribute to the previous heroic services of the Armies of France on the important battle front upon which the memorial has been constructed". It is the largest of the American war memorials in Europe and was erected by the United States Government. The memorial was designed by John Russell Pope and unveiled on August 1, 1937. The tower is more than 200 feet (61 m) above the hill. The observation platform of the memorial can be reached by ascending 234 stairs, and offers an excellent view of the battlefield.

GPS: 49°16'21.7"N 5°08'30.2"E

The large Pennsylvania memorial in Varennes-en-Argonne is located directly behind the park at 1 Rue du Gen. Pershing overlooking the Aire Valley.

The memorial was erected by the State of Pennsylvania in 1927 to honor the volunteers from Pennsylvania who gave their lives in France during the first world war. It is constructed by the Pennsylvania Monuments Commission and was designed by architects Thomas H. Atherton and Paul P. Cret.

GPS: 49°13'34.5"N 5°01'52.6"E

Just to the east of the village of Longueval lies Delville Wood, soon known to the Allied soldiers who fought here in 1916 as the Devil's Wood.

The South African National Memorial in Delville Wood was unveiled in 1926 and commemorates the 10.000 South African dead of the First World War. It is topped by a sculpture of Castor and Polloux holding hands and was designed as a symbol of the unity of the English and Africans of South Africa.

" It is by far the most beautiful World War 1 Memorial. "    Webmaster René Brouwer

GPS: 50°01'28.2"N 2°48'45.8"E

Opened on 31 July 1932 by the Prince of Wales, the Thiepval memorial was and remains the memorial contains the names of 73,357 British and South African men who have no known grave and who fell on the Somme between July 1916 and 20 March 1918.
The 150ft high memorial was designed by Sir Edwin Lutyens.

GPS: 50°03'02.0"N 2°41'08.9"E

The hill of Notre Dame de Lorette, which rises 165 metres (500 feet) above sealevel, is situated in Artois. It's close to the road which runs from Arras to Béthune. The Battle of Lorette lasted 12 months from October 1914 to October 1915 and claimed numerous victims. Over 100.000 people were killed and as many were wounded on both sides. On the cemetery are more than 20.000 individual tombs. There are 8 ossuaries (the main one being at the bottom of the Lantern Tower) where the bones of 22970 unknown soldiers have been gathered. The Lantern Tower and the Chapel are in the center of the cemetery.

GPS: 50°24'04.0"N 2°43'09.0"E

The Ulster Tower commemorates the men of the 36th (Ulster) Division who fought and died along the Western Front. The Tower was dedicated on 19th November 1921, and is a copy of St Helen's Tower at Clandeboye, County Down, close to where the Ulster Division did its training in 1914-15.

On Mondays the Tower is closed.

GPS: 50°03'40.4"N 2°40'49.1"E

The Canadian memorial on top of Vimy Ridge is Canada's most important memorial to the fallen soldiers of World War I. The Memorial commemorates Canada's role in the First World War with stone figures that symbolize the values defended and the sacrifices made. The central statue of a woman represents Canada - a young nation mourning her fallen sons. Canadian architect and sculptor Walter Seymour Allward designed the monument.

The land for the memorial as well as the surrounding 100 hectares were given to Canada by France in 1922 in gratitude for sacrifices made by Canada in the First World War and for the victory achieved by Canadian troops in capturing Vimy Ridge in April 1917.

The memorial was built by the people of Canada as a tribute to their countrymen who fought in the Great War and, particularly, to the more than 66.000 men who gave their lives to defend freedom.

Vimy Ridge is today wooded, each tree planted by a native of Canada and representing the sacrifice of a Canadian soldier.

GPS: 50°22'46.5"N 2°46'26.0"E

The Sommepy American Monument commemorates the achievements of the American units that served in combat with the French Fourth Army during the summer and fall of 1918. More than 70,000 Americans served in the region during this time.

It is a tower of golden-yellow limestone with an observation tower on top affording an excellent view of the battlefields. The monument is surrounded by vestiges of World War 1 trenches, dugouts and gun emplacements.

This monument was built and is maintained by the American Battle Monuments Commission. The architect was Arthur Loomis Harmon of New York, one of the architects used by the American Battle Monuments Commission. The monument was dedicated in 1937.

Weather permitting, it is open daily.

GPS: 49°17'02.8"N 4°32'10.4"E

This ossuary site contains the remains of 10.000 French soldiers who fell on the Champagne front.

General Henri Gourau, who commanded the 4th Army in Champagne in 1916, was later buried in the crypt at his request in 1946. He asked to be buried with his men in the "Ferme de Navarin".

The monument, built in the shape of a pyramid, was solemnly inaugurated by Joseph Joffre in 1924.

GPS: 49°13'06.7"N 4°32'31.4"E

Eugène Adrien Roland Georges Garros
French aviator and a fighter pilot

Roland Garros was a French pioneering aviator and fighter pilot during World War I and early days of aviation. He was born on October 6, 1888 in Saint-Denis, Réunion, and died in aerial combat on October 5, 1918 in Saint-Morel. He obtained his pilot's license at Cholet airport in Maine-et-Loire. On September 23, 1913 he gained fame for making the first non-stop flight across the Mediterranean Sea from Fréjus-Saint Raphaël in the south of France to Bizerte in Tunisia.

At the start of the First World War, Roland Garros volunteered and immediately became a military pilot. In early April 1915 he managed to shoot down three German aircraft in just two weeks time, at Veurne, Kortemark and Wervik. On April 18, 1915 while attacking a train at Lendelede railway station, he dropped two small grenades and was shot at himself. He then had to make an emergency landing at Hoog Wallegem in Hulste (now part of Harelbeke). There, German forces made him a prisoner of war and also confiscated his plane, which he had tried to set on fire after landing. Roland Garros stayed as a prisoner of war in various places in Germany, where he tried to escape several times. In early 1918 he escaped from a camp in Magdeburg and managed to return to France via the Netherlands. After a period of recovery he was able to return to work as a fighter pilot. On October 2, 1918, he shot down his fourth plane. Three days later on October 5, 1918 he was shot down and killed near Saint-Morel, a month before the end ofthe war and one day before his 30th birthday. His adversary was probably German ace Hermann Habich from Jasta 49, flying a Fokker D.VII. He was buried in neighboring Vouziers

In 1928, the Roland Garros tennis stadium was named in his memory; the French Open tennis tournament takes the name of Roland Garros from the stadium in which it is held.

GPS Crashsite: 49°20'59.6"N 4°40'53.1"E
GPS Grave: 49°24'00.8"N 4°41'54.3"E

For more information visit:

Roland Garros on Wikiedia EN

Roland Garros on Wikiedia NL

Captain Charles Dashiell Harris
6th Engineers regiment, 3rd Infantery Division

At 7 a.m, on October 20, 1918, after the failure of the previous Infantery assault, three companies of the 6th Engineers led by Captain Harris, decided to launch their own attempt to gain the Clairs Chenes Woods. With a small detachment, Captain Harris captured two machine guns and three prisoners. Seeing that the Germans were preparing a counter attack, he seized one of the machine guns, advanced toward an open space to get a clear of fire and fired against the enemy when he was shot through the left lung. His men tried to carry him to an American aid station but lost their way in the forest and where captured by the enemy. Captain Harris was carried to a German first aid station near Aincreville where he died. He was respectfully buried by the Germans, about 600 yards southeast of the village.

On January 1919, his uncle, Lieutenant-Colonel Seale Harris, a doctor in Paris,went to Aincreville and moved the Captain's body to an area not subject to flooding. After several round trips between Aincreville and Romagne, Captain Harris remains were ultimately repatriated to the U.S.A., on June 21, 1921.
On November 1921, General Peter Charles Harris wrote a letter to the Mayor of Clery-le-Grand that he was seeking to purchase a small section of land suitable to eract a memorial for his son. The municipality accepted and gifted a 60 square meter plot of land to him, nearby the place where Captain Harris fell (49°21'06.2"N 5°07'30.3"E).
In 1988, on the initiative of M. Norman B. IORIO, superintendent at the Romagne American Cemetery, and the municipality of Clery-le-Grand, Captain Harris' memorial was moved to a more suitable place near the path between Cunel and Clery-le-Grand.
On October 23, 1993, Captain Harris was made an honorary citizen of Clery-le-Grand.

Captain Harris was posthumously awarded the American Distinguished Service Cross.

GPS Memorial: 49°20'57.9"N 5°07'52.3"E
GPS Aincreville Monument: 49°22'02.8"N 5°07'16.1"E

For more information visit:

Captain Charles Harris FR (use translate in browser)