Walking with the Ghosts of Verdun ; Death Was a Relief to Many Trapped in This Hell As Remembrance Day Nears, Tom Bower Visits the Killing Fields of France's Bloodiest Battle

Summary

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STANDING in the drizzle, peering through misty glass at the bones of 130,000 French and German soldiers killed during the Verdun inferno, was a chilling introduction to the worst slaughter of the First World War.

Stored in the Ossuaire, a huge, shabby stone mausoleum in the midst of the hillside battlefields, the indelible remains of brave soldiers, bled and blown to death across the surrounding farmland, is testament to the power of 60million artillery shells fired for ten months after Germany's surprise attack on February 21, 1916.

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Extract

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Walking with the Ghosts of Verdun ; Death Was a Relief to Many Trapped in This Hell As Remembrance Day Nears, Tom Bower Visits the Killing Fields of France's Bloodiest Battle

Even 90 years after the start of the Great War, soldiers' bones are still regularly found in the surrounding hills a moonscape of incurable shell holes and deposited in the vast vault underneath an eerie edifice of marble coffins and inscriptions listing the dead.

The crude awfulness of the Ossuaire reminds visitors that Verdun was not simply a battle of extermination but, even as it was fought, was recognised as the emotional battle for the survival of France. Most tou...

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