The first stop on the Third Form Battlefields trip was in Poperinge, where pupils visited Talbot House – a ‘home from home’ for servicemen – and the Death Cell, where we learnt about the chilling consequences for soldiers who were court-martialled. Pupils then visited Ypres, and joined the long-standing ceremony of commemoration at the Menin Gate – a daily ritual broken only by the Second World War since the opening of the Gate in 1927.
The group then headed South down the western front to Vimy Ridge and on to the Somme. Visits to Lochnagar, Thiepval and Newfoundland Park brought home the scale of the conflict in this area, with the macabre narrative of the battle juxtaposing the beautiful peace and tranquillity that is such a feature of the memorials.
On the final day, after a visit to Essex Farm and the Passchendaele Museum in Zonnebeke, the trip ended at Tyne Cot where Josh (Third Form, Feilden) played the Last Post, Freya (Third Form, Queen Anne) read Binyon’s For the Fallen, and Johannes (Third Form, Feilden) laid a wreath on behalf of the School.
