Some of the officers who commanded forces at the First Battle of Ypres would remain at the salient – rising in rank and responsibility. For some it was the graveyard of their careers. A few were sacked but others were posted away to less challenging commands. The French Army had a slang word – Limogé – implying that the failed general had been posted to the city of Limoges far from the front where he would be given a titular command. As casualty rates mounted there were personality clashes at the highest level with officers angered by what they saw as crass or ill-thought through plans and tactics. However the Ypres Salient would also be the proving ground for outstanding British commanders, men like Allenby and Rawlinson. It was perhaps, even more so than the Somme, the defining of the lions and the donkeys. The challenge of command at Ypres was the ever-changing nature of the war that saw those early days of the ‘Race to the Sea’ descend into the stasis of the trenches, and it is in many ways unsurprising that men who had honed their generalship in the Boer War struggled with the sheer industrial nature of the conflict that was to come.
Click on the links below to read more about the military commanders of Ypres:
* British military commanders at Ypres
* French military commanders at Ypres
* German military commanders at Ypres
Ypres was a medieval town known for its textiles; however, it became infamous during the Great War with trench warfare, poison gas and many thousands of casualties. As the German Army advanced through Belgium, it failed to take the Ypres Salient. On 13 October 1914, German troops entered Ypres. On looting the city, the Germans retreated as the British Expeditionary Force advanced. On 22 November 1914, the Germans commenced a huge artillery barrage killing many civilians. Today the battlefields of Ypres contain the resting place of thousands of German and British soldiers. Battle Story: Ypres explores the first and second battles of Ypres through narrative, eye-witness accounts and images.