This month marks the 99th anniversary of the U.S. Marine assault on Belleau Wood, so I thought I could share a few things that will help you understand what the media has to say about it. These comments and the graphic I've constructed below are based my own observations and questions and observations I've had from tour members on over a dozen visits to Belleau Wood.
1. It is bigger than most people expect; the map below covers over a square mile. You can't see it all from one position.
2. The attack direction (red arrows) is not north to south, but from the southwest to northeast. This is because the Marines were attacking the side of a salient created by the recent German push to Château-Thierry and the Marne river, which are southeast of Belleau Wood.
3. The American Cemetery is not shown on the graphic. It is just to the right of of the last letter of the "Hunting Lodge" caption, but the wood is on a plateau and there is an abrupt drop-off down to the cemetery.
4. The bottom illustration, C, by noted French artist George Scott, accurately depicts the wood at the end of the fighting. Following the battle of Belleau Wood, Scott traveled to the battlefield and interviewed Marine veterans of the struggle
Just read chapters on this battle in _Thunder and Flames_.
ReplyDeleteA profound and thought provoking location. The ABMC has a superb self-guided tour of the Woods.
ReplyDeleteI have an ongoing project where I am working on photos my grandfather took during his service with the medical corps after the armistice. I was recently looking at a half dozen or so showing destruction in the Belleau Woods area.
ReplyDeleteThen you post this article.
Synchronicity is interesting!
Paul, Do you have these pictures posted anywhere? I would like to see them because my father fought in Belleau Wood and through to the end of the war. I would like to see pictures of anywhere (and everywhere) the Marines fought during The World War.
DeleteI sent the 4 that I have to Jerry in response to a direct email.
DeleteIn case others are interested here are links to them on Google Drive.
I'm pretty sure anyone can access them but let me know if not.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B9KgObbiURaHUGNNZ2d0ZWJKcU0/view
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B9KgObbiURaHN05ma0g5U1Z3VEk/view
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B9KgObbiURaHaFZYVFlKUjN3eE0/view
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B9KgObbiURaHN2F6LVFUWUs5Nms/view
Those images sound great, Paul.
ReplyDeleteTurns out there are only 4 Belleau Woods photos total. All are old, faded BW that I have not gotten around to trying to improve.
ReplyDeleteFor me, one of the interesting things about my photo collection is that my grandfather wrote captions on about 80% of the photos so I have some idea of what and where they are at least.
The Belleau Woods ones include the following:
2 photos of blown up trees simply labeled "Belleau Woods"
1 photo of a few people looking around labeled "Amex cemetery at Belleau Woods"
1 photo showing a small, partially destroyed, 2 story building with onlookers labeled
"Old German machine gun nest in Belleau Woods. Bosche graves along side"
These are from a "secondary" collection. If interested, see the following sites for info and sample photos from my "main" collection. Read the introduction on the first site for some background info.
http://www.typicalfrenchkiddies.com
A selection of photos is also on
http://typicalfrenchkiddies.tumblr.com
I also have a (harder to navigate) Facebook page at
https://www.facebook.com/TypicalFrenchKiddies
Thanks for looking!
Paul
Paul, those photos (on Tumblr and Facebook) are fascinating. Thank you for doing this work.
ReplyDelete