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The front ran along the Yser river (IJzer) and Yser Canal (Ieperlee) in the far north-west of Belgium and defended a small strip of the country which remained unoccupied. The front was established following the Battle of the Yser in October 1914, when the Belgian army succeeded in stopping the German advance after months of retreat and remained ...
The Battle of the Yser (French: Bataille de l'Yser, Dutch: Slag om de IJzer) was a battle of the First World War that took place in October 1914 between the towns of Nieuwpoort and Diksmuide, along a 35 km (22 mi) stretch of the Yser River and the Yperlee Canal, in Belgium. [4]
The Belgian fortifications on the Yser Front along the canal bank consisted of a trench and a series of bunkers, all designed to halt the German advance. To the north of the Belgian fortifications is an area where the German army successfully crossed the Yser Canal and erected a concrete bunker, only a few yards away from where the Belgian army ...
Following the Battle of the Yser in October, the Belgian army remained entrenched along the Yser Front and was left with a number of armoured cars which could not be used. In early 1915, the Russian Tsar Nicholas II formally requested military support from King Albert I and a self-contained unit was formed for service in Russia. [ 2 ]
The Yser (US: / iː ˈ z ɛər / ee-ZAIR, [1] French:; Dutch: IJzer ⓘ) is a river that rises in French Flanders (the north of France), enters the Belgian province of West Flanders and flows through the Ganzepoot and into the North Sea at the town of Nieuwpoort.
The Yser Towers (Dutch: IJzertoren) are a monument complex near the Yser river at Diksmuide, West Flanders in Belgium. The first tower was built in 1928–30 to commemorate the Belgian soldiers killed on the surrounding Yser Front during World War I and as a monument to Christian pacifism .
In the centre of the front was a 2,000 yd (1.1 mi; 1.8 km) stretch with no crossing over the Yser; no man's land was 65–80 yd (59–73 m) wide. [12] There was very little cover for artillery in the area and machine-guns were vulnerable to stoppages from wind-blown sand.
The Group Fortification Yser, or Feste Prince Regent Luitpold, was part of a wider program of fortifications called "Moselstellung", encompassing fortresses scattered between Thionville and Metz in the valley Moselle. The aim of Germany was to protect against a French attack to take back Alsace-Lorraine and Moselle from the German Empire. The ...