Location: |
Loos-en-Gohelle is a village about 5 kilometres
north-west of Lens. The Loos Memorial forms the side and back of Dud
Corner Cemetery where over 1,700 officers and men are buried, the great
majority of whom fell in the Battle of Loos. Dud Corner Cemetery, which
stands almost on the site of a German strong point, the Lens Road Redoubt,
captured by the 15th (Scottish) Division on the first day of the battle,
is located about 1 kilometre west of the village, on the N43, the main
Lens to Bethune road. The Loos Memorial commemorates over 20,000 officers
and men who fell in the area from the River Lys to the old southern
boundary of the First Army, east and west of Grenay, and who have no known
grave. It covers the period from the first day of the Battle of Loos to
the date of the Armistice. On either side of the cemetery is a wall 15
feet high, to which are fixed tablets on which are carved the names of
those commemorated. At the back are four small circular courts, open to
the sky, in which the lines of tablets are continued, and between these
courts are three semicircular walls or apses, two of which carry tablets,
while on the centre apse is erected the Cross of Sacrifice.
|