Visualising the trenches

By Chris BakerArticles

This article draw on the vast resources of the photographic archive of the Imperial War Museum to illustrate the varying and changing nature of the British-held trenches of the Western Front in France and Flanders. The Q and other numbers given in the captions are the IWM reference numbers for each photograph.

Preserved trenches you can visit

But let us begin by taking a look at a couple of “preserved” trench systems which are popular spots on the battlefield tourist trail.

From Atlas Obscura, part of the trench system at Sanctuary Wood Museum near Ypres. Corrugated iron revetting and “elephant iron” overhead cover.
From Wikipedia, a photo of part of the preserved trench system at the Canadian national memorial at Vimy Ridge. Concrete sandbags, concrete duckboards.

There are other preserved sites and they can be interesting and instructive to visit, but it is important to understand the extent to which they represent reality. It is a matter of opinion, but my view is that apart from their locations and that they wiggle like trenches, neither example provides much insight into the war experienced by the men who fought in them.

Trenches in reality

There are hundreds of photographs of the trenches, so we are not short of information. I chose this selection more or less at random, but they serve to make a few points. You will perhaps note how many of them are reserve, support or communication trenches rather than the front line.

Q56198. “Willow Trench. Rue de Bois. Front Line, December 1914. Trench flooded by night when dam burst. Flooding led to informal armistice”. This is an early photograph, taken not long after men began to entrench in this part of French Flanders near Neuve Chapelle. The trench is wide and just about deep above for the men’s heads to be invisible from ground level. The sides are not revetted, and in this area they would simply cave in when wet. Some planks (duckboards) have been laid to walk along the trench. There a few timber shelters rather than dugouts, and no concrete. The trench has no obvious parapet or parados, and appears to be relatively straight (at least, in front of us). There is no firestep, so a man tasked with observing or firing his rifle would need to clamber up the muddy wall a little.
Q50323. “Reserve trench, part of the Le Touquet Defences known in March 1915 as Seven Tree Trench ( note the six trees and one stump). Taken 19th March 1915, from the ground in rear of trench. It was of the High Command type common to Flanders; 1st Battalion King’s Own (Royal Lancaster) Regiment, 4th Division. Ref. Sheet 36. C. 9. d. 5. 9. 1 mile west of Frelinghien, 1 mile north of Houplines”. Much of Flanders is prone to saturated ground and flooding. In some areas, it was not possible to dig trenches to obtain shelter, and instead, defences were constructed above ground level. They were sometimes called “Grouse Butts” or “Breastworks”.
Q4180. “A sentry of the 10th Battalion, Gordon Highlanders at the junction of two trenches – Gourlay Trench and Gordon Alley. Martinpuich, 28 August 1916”. During the Battle of the Somme, the British forces gradually advanced, gaining devastated ground. Trenches such as these, made in the captured ground and often in use only for a short time, were often little more than joined-up shell craters. The Somme area is chalk land and in summer the ground is not prone to collapse as it is in Flanders. When wet, it turns into mud that many said was even worse than that of Flanders.
Q1426. “The view along a communication trench near Zillebeke Lake, Ypres, October 1916”. Revetted with timber and wattle, this trench has clearly existed for some time. It has a wooden duckboard path.
E(AUS)575. “State of the reserve switch trench in December 1916”. A “switch” was a trench not constructed for defence, but for quickly moving men from one spot to another. Note how shallow it is, affording virtually no cover. There is a dugout near the camera on the left but it is not clear whether there was any duckboard.
Q4652. “Sentry of the Lancashire Fusiliers in a front line trench watching German trenches through a mirror periscope. Opposite Messines, near Ploegsteert Wood, January 1917”. A more developed trench in a sector usually relatively quiet. A well sandbagged parapet and parados, corrugated iron revetment and a firestep. Perhaps the nearest thing to a cross between the preserved Sanctuary Wood and Vimy Ridge.
Q5092. “British troops taking up timber for a trench support through a communication trench at Ploegsteert, March 1917”. Again, a well developed trench. Duckboard path, timber revetting, barbed wire defences (see top left).
Q2261. “A British soldier in a reserve trench watches a shell bursting in the distance, Hénin-sur-Cojeul, 27 May 1917”.
Q3088. “A German front line trench northwest of Wytschaete, captured during the Battle of Messines in June 1917 and renamed ‘Oblige Trench’ by the British. Note the sign, written in German: “Telephone exchange; entrance permitted only to men on duty”.” In the offensives of 1917, attacking British troops would often find themselves in, and then having to defend, devastated trenches like this.
E(AUS)825 “Australian 4th Division troops wearing gas-masks in an advanced trench at Garter Point, during the Third Battle of Ypres (Passchendaele), 27 September 1917”. A trench in recently captured and destroyed ground. It is shallow, with few places to shelter from shellfire, no barbed wire defence. In the rear, a reinforced concrete post captured from the Germans.
Q6020. “A barbed wire gate in a trench system to form a block against raiders at Cambrin in trenches held by 1/7th Sherwood Foresters (Nottinghamshire & Derbyshire Regiment), 16 September 1917.”
Q10622. “The Medical Officer of the 12th Battalion ,East Yorkshire Regiment conducts a foot inspection in a support trench near Roclincourt, 9 January 1918.” A remarkably clean and tidy trench; sandbagged, chicken-wired, duckboarded, with a firestep. I often wonder where the men’s boots are while they are undergoing this inspection.
Q10689. “Officers of the 12th Battalion, Royal Irish Regiment outside their HQ dug-out, near Essigny, 7 February 1918. With them is their American Medical Officer.” Where trench positions were static for any great length of time, shelter would be made in the form of dugouts. They might take advantage of existing features such as the foundations of destroyed buildings, but often they were excavated in the ground, with roof supports and shell-proof sandbag layers added.
Q46646. “Ypres-Comines Line. Embankment with dugouts.” Not far from Sanctuary Wood and a good illustration of the difference between 1918 reality and 2020s tourism.

Links

There is much more to find: IWM Search

Life in the trenches