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| Verdun National Cemetery |
We have visited the Champagne Region several times, stopping
to tour the Champagne Vintners in Epernay, admiring the great Cathedrals in
Reims and Troyes, buzzing by on the A4 on our way to the east of France,
driving leisurely through the miles of vineyards. Before this trip, my memories were mostly of
Champagne caves, learning about the process of making the bubbly – from
pressing to riddling to disgorging the sediment and,….of course, tasting.
This trip we saw the more somber side of the Region – the
side that is tragic – the side that is a reminder of the ravages of modern
warfare – the side that requires reflecting and remembering. WWI (1914 -18 War as it is often called in
France) left its impact on the Champagne Region, an impact that is quite
visible even today. Military cemeteries
are everywhere – French, German, Russian, and many in combination. Memorials dot the area in the middle of
fields, on lone hills, in villages large and small.
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| Memorial of Navarin - In the Middle of a Field in the Marne Region |
Not only is this the 100th anniversary of the
start of WWI in Europe but it is the 70th anniversary of D-Day and
the liberation of Paris from Nazi occupation. There have been many television
programs, exhibits, and articles on these events. Throughout France there are
memorials to the sons of the village who died in WWI and WWII. Reminders of war are never far from you in
France, but especially in Champagne because the front moved back and forth over
the four plus years of the war – trench warfare was born in WWI and was
prominent in Champagne.
We visited the Verdun Battle site. Eight villages on the battlefield were not
rebuilt after the War – several have markers to locate the streets and
buildings of the destroyed villages – as memorials. The village of Fleury, for
example, changed hands 16 times during the fighting.
The battle of Verdun lasted for 300 days in an area of less
than 8 square miles. 230,000 French and German soldiers died. 130,000 were not identified and are buried in
a common Ossuary. I visited the Ossuary
in 1971 – it made a lasting impression and this visit reinforced those feelings.
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| Ossuary - 130,000 Unknown Soldiers |
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| Many French Colonial Troops were Muslim |
We also visited the memorial Tranchée des Baionnettes
– Trench of the Bayonets, another site that will make a lasting
impression. A Company of the French 137th
Infantry Regiment had been decimated by German shelling. The remainder of the Company had been placed
in exposed trenches to fend off the attack.
Not until after the War did they discover the fate of the Company. A trench was found completely filled in with
only a row of rusting riles and bayonets protruding through the earth with a
body under each.
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| Memorial to the Trench of the Bayonets |
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| The Line of Bayonets |
Although casualty statistics are still in dispute,
the scale of the bloodshed in WWI is not in doubt: Russia 1.7 million combat deaths: France 1.35
million; British Empire 900,000; Germany 1.77 million. Civilian casualties were also horrendous. Casualties
for the United States were 116,000 military deaths with about 700 civilians
killed (Lusitania sinking and merchant marines killed in submarine
attacks). In comparison, French civilian
deaths were 40,000; Russia 410,000. If
you include disease and malnutrition, the numbers are much higher. Is it any
wonder, that nearly every French family was touched? Marie-Elisabeth is no exception. Her great-grandfather, a civilian, was killed
in Amiens and many cousins of her grandparents died in the Great War.
What was our motivation to go to Champagne? The main reason we spent our week in
Champagne was to follow Emile Duchemin’s WWI Diary to the places he and his
troops served in the region. Emile is Marie-Elisabeth’s grandfather. Our journey also coincided with the 100th
anniversary of the start of the Great War in Europe.
Grandpère Duchemin was an officer in the French Colonial Army. We researched his records at the Military Archives in Paris in 2012. His career parallels the history of the French Colonial Empire in many respects. He and his family, including my mother-in-law, lived in Hanoi for five years in the 1920s. From 1896 until the War, he served in China, Madagascar, Sudan, French Equatorial Africa, etc. After serving in France for the first two years of WWI, he was sent to Cameroon to administer a hospital. Cameroon, a German Colony at the time, is one of the areas of Africa where WWI was fought – a relatively unknown part of the War.
In Champagne, Emile led troops who brought the wounded from
the battlefront to triage centers before they were sent to hospitals further
behind the lines. He was also
responsible for establishing cemeteries. Marie-Elisabeth spent many hours going
through his Diary to develop a timeline of where he served. Because of the constantly moving front, this
was not easy to establish.
Our first stop was a Center for Interpretation of the
1914-18 War in the Marne area – in Suippes, France. Not only was the museum interesting but the
staff was very helpful. They used their data bases to help Marie-Elisabeth look
for the cemeteries her grandfather established and for the location of the
burial sites of relatives killed in the war.
We learned that the cemeteries had been moved and consolidated with
others into larger memorial sites. As
with many in WWI, the relatives did not have marked graves but were in
ossuaries. Very emotional
information.
We had so many amazing experiences during the week but a few
stand out. The owners of the house we
were renting in Bouy, France, told us about the site of the battle of
Massiges. A flight over the area
revealed patterns on a hill that appeared to show remnants of trenches. Two
friends bought the property and started excavating. When we arrived at the site, there was one
parked vehicle but no one was around. We
could see a massive crater that turned out to be one of the places where the military
tunneled under their opponents and then set off huge explosions under the
unsuspecting troops. There were trenches
that had been uncovered with interpretive signs and pictures from the
time. We started walking through the
trenches.
Due to rain the previous day, it was muddy, giving us a VERY small taste of what men went through during those long days of siege. In a few minutes, a man approached us in the trench and it turned out he was one of the men who bought the site and had done much of the excavation. We ended up with our own private guide! The guide, a local farmer, was very interested in Emile Duchemin’s Diary - Marie-Elisabeth will email it to him. Grandpère had established the cemetery in the village of Massiges and he and his men had evacuated wounded and the dead from this battle.
In the Diary, Emile mentioned a statue of the Virgin that
was moved to the cemetery he established.
We were told by our farmer "guide" that the men would stop to touch it and pray on the way to
battle. When we got to the village,
there was the Statue!!! It is now called
the Virgin of the Bees and is famous in the Region. The statue was originally placed in the
village in 1865 in thanks for the inhabitants being spared in a Cholera
outbreak. At the beginning of the
shelling during WWI, the statue was knocked off its pedestal. A hole was made in the side and a hive of
bees took up residence! Of course, in
1914 Emile would not have known that it would eventually be known as the Virgin
of the Bees!
In front of the Statue of the Virgin was an Information
Panel that included a picture of the Cemetery that Grandpère had established
with the Statue plain as day!!! We
learned from the farmer that the cemetery was about 100 meters to the north of
the present location of the Virgin. The
villagers had moved it back to its original location when the military cemetery
was consolidated with others in the region.
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| Vierge des Abeilles - Virgin of the Bees |
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| Photograph of the Cemetery Established by Emile Duchemin in Massiges, France with the Statute of the Virgin |
On another day’s excursion we were looking for a farm that
Emile mentioned where he and his men had stayed. We drove into the village where we thought it
was located. A man was outside his barn
and we stopped to ask. No – we were in
the wrong place but he knew where it was – miles away at a crossroads of two
main highways. He said the farm was now
gone but there was a marker. When we got
to the crossroads, we saw nothing. We
continued down the road for a mile or two and stopped at a farm where we saw
a man in the courtyard of the out-buildings. Again, we stopped to ask. He told us the marker was gone but that he
knew about the farm. In fact, he
collected old post cards and had some pictures of the place. Next thing we knew he invites us into the
house to see the postcards.
Marie-Elisabeth was able to photograph the cards. He was also interested in the Diary – to be
emailed to him soon. In reading the
Diary in more detail later, Marie-Elisabeth realized that the name of his farm
was also in the Diary! More
coincidences!
My last story of an amazing experience was on our last day
in Champagne. We drove into a small village – population 65 – where Grandpère
Duchemin wrote about staying with his troops.
He mentioned several details about the village and where there had been
a triage center. We started looking for someone who might know something about the village…but no one was visible. We
drove around at least three times from street to street.
We finally saw a woman bringing flowers from
her garden to the house. We stopped and
M.E. started talking to her. The woman, Nicole, then called the former mayor of the village who drove over to meet us. He brought a hand drafted map that showed what
the village was like during the war and where the troops had been. Next thing
we knew Nicole was making copies on her scanner for us. They both mentioned pictures in City
Hall…and then….she produced a key to City Hall and took us over to see
these pictures. It turns out Nicole was a
volunteer assistant to the new mayor!
(City Hall is open for an hour or two one day a week!) They showed us the pictures and we
photographed them. The former mayor then
walked with us to show us the building where Grandpere stayed and worked!
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| The Triage Center in 2014 Where Emile Duchemin and His Troops Worked in 1914 in Courtemont, France |
WHAT A DAY!
WHAT A WEEK!
WHAT EXPERIENCES!
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