“Dozinghem” is a British-invented name. It was one of several given the locations in the area of Poperinghe and Proven in West Flanders, Belgium, and is in the style of local village names which often end “..inghem” (today they would be spelled at “…ingem”). They are humourous, for they applied to locations of military hospitals and included not only “Dozinghem”, but “Bandaghem” and “Mendinghem”. The former is sometimes seen spelled as “Dosinghem”. It was the most easterly of the three: that is, the nearest to the front line. At the time, that was about 15 miles away to the east.
During 1916, the construction of an additional railway line to support operations in the Ypres salient was commenced, and “Dozinghem” would be a development of this work. The railway would link the Channel ports through Bergues to Proven and then off via “Dozinghem” and “International Corner” to Elverdinghe and Boesinghe. It was a twin track route at Dozinghem, where a siding was constructed for sites to be used by Casualty Clearing Stations.
The 61st (2/1st South Midland) Casualty Clearing Station was the first to arrive to occupy “Dozinghem”. On 5 June 1917 it arrived by railway at Proven, having travelled up from the Somme, and proceeded to the site. It opened for admissions of wounded men a week later, and on 27 June was also opened for all infectious disease cases from units of Fifth Army. It later also became a specialist eye centre. The 4th and 47th (1/1st Home Counties) Casualty Clearing Stations arrived on 17 and 19 June and also began to set up. The former noted that the site was very rough, needing much work and that they struggled to find enough labour to make rapid progress in constructing it. 47th CCS set up as a specialist centre for poison gas and “not yet diagnosed nervous” cases.
In the evenings of 17 and 20 August 1917, during the Third Battle of Ypres which made “Dozinghem” incredibly busy, 61st CCS was bombed from the air. In the first raid, one man was killed and 11 others wounded; the latter included three nursing sisters. One bomb also fell in the officer’s lines of 4th CCS, wounding four officers and 4 men. The second raid on 61st CCS killed four and wounded 18, all of whom were patients, while 4th CCS suffered 32 casualties, of which one was an attached French interpreter who was killed. A further air raid on 61st CCS on 29 October 1917 killed an orderly and three patients, and wounded four others including a female nurse and a German prisoner of war. 47th CCS reported no bombs or casualties from the raids.
The CWGC says of Dozinghem Military Cemetery, “The 4th, 47th and 61st Casualty Clearing Stations were posted at Dozinghem and the military cemetery was used by them until early in 1918. There are now 3,174 Commonwealth burials of the First World War in the cemetery and 65 German war graves from this period. The cemetery also contains 73 Second World War burials dating from the Allied withdrawal to Dunkirk in May 1940. The cemetery was designed by Sir Reginald Blomfield.”
The earliest British death recorded at the cemetery is that of Sapper 548629 Charles Frederick Barbridge Barber of 510 (1/2nd London) Field Company of the Royal Engineers. He was killed by enemy shellfire when working near Elverdinghe on 24 June 1917, aged 20, and evidently brought back to this site for burial.
The three CCS were sent elsewhere in the period January to March 1918.