Oct 2008 - Morrison's Academy

Page 144 The Morrisonian | 07/08 School Trips
WW1 Belgium Trip
First World War Trip to Belgium (cont.)
cemeteries. A very disturbing visit was
when we went to Langemark
cemetery where just under 25 000
German soldiers were buried. It was
very unsettling when we were told
that 20 000 men were buried in a
small pit in front of us; it was
impossible to comprehend how many
people died in the war. Langemark
was a very different experience
compared to the British and French
cemeteries. It had a very cold and
eerie atmosphere with black slabs for
gravestones whereas the British
graveyards were bright and each
soldier had their own headstone.
The most touching and moving part
of the trip for me personally was when
we went to Tyne Cot where 12 000
men were buried. We also saw the
names of two former pupils who had
no known grave, P. Laurence and W.S
Turnbull. Here Mr O’Kane read out
poems of our choice and for the first
time I fully understood the scale of the
tragedies.
It was extremely tear-jerking to read
the personal messages on the
headstones of some of the soldiers,
“In sweet memory of Dadda ”
“ Always will you be missed by your
beloved wife, Amy ”
“ He answered the call
and paid the toll ”
“O’ for the touch of a vanished hand
O’ for the sound of a voice now still”.
It really puts into perspective the
brutality and futility of the war and
how the hundreds of thousands of
men who were killed were longed for,
missed and loved by their families
back home.
Emily Coffey S3
Langemark Cemetery
The laughter ended immediately as
we stepped through the rot iron gates
into the cemetery. There were no
flowers, no warmth or anything except
the sinister, morbid atmosphere of the
graveyard. The Belgian sunlight had
been deflected by several gnarled,
aged oaks leaving only a sickening
pale green light to illuminate the
black slabs.
I walked among the graves, pausing
to glance at the names etched into
the stone. Here were the names of
forty thousand young men who left
Germany over ninety years ago and
now lay four or five to a grave in this
eerie corner of Belgium. I walked
back to the entrance passing four
large faceless statues that cast long
shadows in their uniforms. In the
middle of the cemetery there was a
mass grave containing the remains of
twenty thousand soldiers. A shiver
crept down my spine at the sight of
this and I turned to leave.
As I exited into the censurably warmer
sunshine just beyond the black gates,
I knew I would never forget that
forbidding cemetery and the
impression it left with me.
Gregor Gray S3
Ypres centre
Essex Farm
In Flanders Field
Newfoundland Caribou
Tyne Cot