Ration Farm Cemetery, Chapelles D'Armentieres, France. 

 

Graves from World War One, including that of Rifleman Oliver Frank Pennefather, of the 2nd Battalion, 3rd New Zealand Rifle Brigade, killed in action 10th July 1916. Frank's great niece Bridget asked me if I would be going anywhere near the cemetery on my European trip, and although I hadn't planned to visit the cemetery, my route took me literally past it. As Bridget and her family had never seen a picture of Frank's grave, it was the least I could do to add a stop there to photograph Frank's grave and to take some video footage of the cemetery to send to Bridget. 

 

Some 677 of the 1,313 casualties are unidentified, and many of the Australian casualties are from the assault on Fromelles on 19 July 1916. 

 

Ffrom the CWGC Website:

For much of the war, Ration Farm was just over 1 kilometre behind the front line at the end of a communication trench. The first cemetery, Ration Farm Old Military Cemetery, was begun in February 1915, close beside the farm buildings. It was used until October 1915 chiefly by units of the 6th Division and at the Armistice it contained 73 graves.

 

In April 1923, these graves were moved into Plot VI of the present cemetery, at the request of the French authorities. The present cemetery was begun (as Ration Farm New Military Cemetery) in October 1915 and remained in use until October 1918. It was very greatly increased after the Armistice when graves were brought in from isolated sites and small cemeteries on the battlefield, including:- CHAPEL FARM CEMETERY, FLEURBAIX, which was 2 kms West of Bois Grenier. It contained 11 British graves of 1915 and 1916. FERME-DU-BIEZ MILITARY CEMETERY, La Chapelle D'Armentieres, which was 2 kms South East of that village. It contained 36 British graves of 1915 and 1918. For the most part, Plots I to V contain the original burials.

 

Among the isolated graves brought in were many of Australian soldiers who died in the Attack at Fromelles (*) on 19 July 1916. There are now 1,313 Commonwealth servicemen of the First World War buried or commemorated in the cemetery. 677 of the burials are unidentified, but there are special memorials to six casualties know(n) or believed to be buried among them. The cemetery was designed by Sir Herbert Baker.

 

(*) The Battle of Fromelles 19-29 July 1916 was the first battle where Australians (5th Div) and British (61st South Midlands) Divisions fought alongside each other in the line. It was largely disastrous, and is consideed the worst day in Australian military history with 5,500 casualties (misssing, wounded and killed) with the British 61st Div losing a further 1,500. Over 1,000 of the casualties were listed as missing.

 

In July 2010 a new cemetery was built and opened, Fromelles (Pheasant Wood) Military Cemetery, following from the discovery of 250 bodies in mass graves dug by the Germans after the battle. The gaves were located by dogged detective work by Lambis Englezos, a Melbourne -based retired teacher and amateur historian who dedicated 5 years into painstaking research, including analsying aerial reconnaissance photographs of the area to determine areas of fresh digging (as opposed to earth disturbed by shellfire) to locate the graves.

 

Of the 250 bodies recovered, DNA and other research confirmed that:

225 were Australian soldiers, 59 of which remain unidentified

23 are entirely unidentified Commonwealth (British or Australan) soldiers 

2 are British soldiers who remain unidentified. 

Rifleman Oliver Frank Pennefather, 2nd Bn, 3rd NZ Rifle Brigade