At the beginning of 1914 Australia was alreadyaware of potential dangers caused by the closeproximity of the German colony of New Guinea

and the Bismark Archipelago. The German navy’sgrowing power and activity in the Pacific Ocean werealarming.

On 28 June Franz-Ferdinand, the heir to the Austrianempire, was assassinated by a Serbian student in Sarajevo,Bosnia-Herzogovina. This led to a sequence of threats andultimatums between Austria, Hungary, Serbia, Russia,Germany, France and Great Britain. Finally, Germanydeclared war on France on 3 August, followed by theBritish declaration of war on Germany on 4 August. Allthe dominions of the British Empire immediately declaredtheir support for the “Mother Country” : Andrew Fisher,the Australian Labour prime minister, promised thatAustralia would commit herself “to the last man and thelast shilling”.

Under the terms of the Defence Act the regular army couldnot be deployed outside Australia. On 8 August, therefore,an expeditionary force was created to serve overseas forthe duration of the war. Thus the “Australian ImperialForce” entered history, to be better known as the A.I.F. Therecruiting campaign opened on 10 August. From all sides,from the bush and the towns, crowds of young men fromall social backgrounds flooded in enthusiastically to themajor centres. By the end of August 20,000 applicants hadbeen registered in Sydney.

The first Australian contribution took the form of a smallexpeditionary corps, set up hastily in response to a requestfrom London. In September 1914 it liberated the Germancolonies of New Guinea, New Britain and New Ireland. Inthe same year the famous Anzac corps (made up ofAustralians and New Zealanders) was constituted in Egypt.After guarding the Suez Canal in 1914, it took part in theDardanelles campaign in 1915.

It was the German attack on Verdun on 21 February 1916that brought increasing numbers of British troops toFrance, reinforced by the expeditionary corps from the sixEmpire dominions. The 80,000 men of the 1st Anzac corpslanded at Marseilles in March 1916 on their way to theSomme. After the arrival of the 2nd Anzac corps in June,the two corps fought in France and Belgium until the endof the war. The number of recruits in Australia reached atotal of 417,000 out of a population of 4,875,000 in 1914.331,000 served overseas. The final total of casualtiesreached 4215,000, included 59,000 dead.

The total number of Australian casualties - 64.8 per cent ofcombatants - was the heaviest of all thedominions. In the Somme thereare still today some olderresidents who recall with greatemotion those tall, friendly andwarm-hearted young men withtheir characteristic appearance,wearing the famous hat with theturned-back brim.

Australian Memorial ParkThis park was laid out by theAustralian government. Apart from a memorial brought from Australia(the Australian Corps Memorial inaugurated on 7 August 1998),the site's panoramic displays andexplanatory panels explain the strategic significance of the siteduring the battle. Some trencheshave been preserved here. This site is open all the year round, with freeand open access (parking space,toilets, picnic area).

Open at all times

Close to the church, an Australiancommemorative plaquedescribes the battles which tookplace at Le Hamel.

Le Hamel

This village and its surrounding area are important feature inAustralian military history. On 4 July 1918, with the support of

American forces, General Monash launched a spirited and victo-rious attack which for the first time combined infantery, artillery,tanks and parachute troops - a fore-runner of modern war tactics.

“Never forget Australia”The victorious engagement ofthe Australian forces, whichshortly afterwards were toacquire their own independentcommand formed the basis ofclose links between the people of Australia and the inhabitants of this small Picardycommune.

The British King and Queen inaugurated the AustralianNational Memorial in 1938.Anzac Day is commemoratedhere every year. Celebrated on25 April, Remembrance Day inAustralia, it is dedicated to thememory of Australians whowere killed during the FirstWorld War. Villers-Bretonneuxholds its ceremony on theSaturday nearest to 25 April.

Villers-Bretonneux

Villers-Bretonneux sawaction in August 1914

and the incessant movement of British and

French troops over the next four years ; but the name of this large village entered the history of the war on 24 April 1918 when Australian troops finally halted the German offensive ofMarch 1918. Since the construction of the Victoria School in 1927 and the inauguration of the memorial in 1938, public and private links with Australia have grown steadily stronger.The twinning with Robinvale and the exhumation in France and reinterment in Canberra of the Australian Unknown Soldier in November 1993 have sealed this close relationship. Its history,the annual visit of the Australian ambassador to commemorate Anzac day on the Saturday nearest to 25 April, and the many Australian visitors throughout the year, give the village an image and identity in Australia that are not easily grasped here.

TGVHaute-Picardie

Station

E n g l i s h C h a n n e l

The Battlefields of the Somme

The Battlefields of the SommeThe Australiansin the Somme

The Franco-Australian MuseumThe first floor of the school building,“the gift of the children of theschools in Victoria to the children of Villers-Bretonneux”, contains the Franco-Australian museum. Itillustrates the role of the Australiantroops during the First World War(photographs, models, uniforms,weapons,…). It also has a documen-tation centre and a video room.

Victoria School - 9, rue Victoria80800 Villers-Bretonneux Tel./fax : +33(0)322968079www.museeaustralien.com

Open: Tuesday afternoon-Saturday,10.00 - 12.30 am and 14.00 - 18.00;also the first and third Sunday afternoon of each month.

Adult : 4 € - Children (6-18) : 2.50 €

Mairie (town hall)The mairie entrance hall contains a large number of Australian souvenirs (maps, leaflets, etc).

The Australian National memorialThis imposing white stone memorial(on the RD 23 road to Fouilloy)consists of a tall central tower and two corner pavilions linked to the tower by plain walls that bearthe names of the missing-soldierswho have no known grave.Inaugurated in 1938, it is the location for an annual celebration of Anzac Day.

Open at all times

Adelaide CemeteryIn 1993 the body of the AustralianUnknown Soldier was exhumed inAdelaide Cemetery and taken toAustralia for burial at Canberra.A carved stele commemorates thisevent. As you approach from Amienson the RN 29 road, it lies on the left on the outskirts of Villers-Bretonneux.

Poppy Country Tourist Office

9, rue Gambetta | BP 8280303 Albert cedex

Tél. +33(0)3 22 75 16 42Fax +33(0)3 22 75 11 72

officedetourisme@paysducoquelicot.comwww.paysducoquelicot.com

Amiens Métropole Tourist Office

6 bis, rue Dusevel | BP 101880010 Amiens cedex1

Tél. +33(0)3 22 71 60 50Fax +33(0)3 22 71 60 51

ot@amiens-metropole.comwww.amiens.com/tourisme

Haute-Somme Tourist Office

1, rue Louis XI | BP 6014680201 Péronne cedexTél. +33(0)3 22 84 42 38Fax +33(0)3 22 84 51 25

accueil@ot-peronne.frwww.ot-peronne.fr

Corbie Bocage Trois Vallées Tourist Office

30, place de la République80800 CorbieTél. +33(0)3 22 96 95 76Fax +33(0)3 22 48 47 07

officetourismecorbie.80@wanadoo.fr

21, rue Ernest-Cauvin • F - 80000 AMIENSTel. +33 (0)3 22712271 • Fax +33 (0)3 22712269

www.somme-battlefields.com

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The brickworksOn 21 April 1918 the aircraft ofManfred von Richthofen crashed inthe field on the opposite side of theroad. Hit by the Canadian pilotBrown, this “ace” of German flying,known as the Red Baron, decided toreturn to Cappy but was apparentlycaught in the fire of Australianground-based machine-guns.He was mortally wounded. Buried bythe Australians with full militaryhonours in the civilian cemetery atBertangles, his body was transferredin 1925 to the German cemetery atFricourt. Later in the same year itwas taken back by his brother toBerlin and finally buried inWiesbaden.

Free open access at all times.

The memorial to the 3rd Australian DivisionWhich distinguished itself at the endof March 1918 by holding back theGerman advance.

Corbie Plateau

In 1918 the German General Hindenburg, making use of troopsliberated from the Eastern Front by the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk,

decided to launch a major offensive on the British lines and forcethem into embarkation between Boulogne and Calais.

The three German armies, positioned in an arc from Arras toLa Fère, attacked on 21 March along a front of 90 kilometres.

Half a million-men were launched into the assault on 160,000 British soldiers.

Albert and Roye fell on 26 March, Montdidier on the 27th, Moreuilon the 30th. Faced with the gravity of the situation, the civilian and military Allied leaders met at Doullens and gave the sole command of the Allied forces to Foch. The arrival of Allied reinforcements slowed down the German advance, which on 4 April encountered the resistance of French troops at Grivesnes.

A final German attempt to take Amiens failed on 25 April at Villers-Bretonneux in the face of Australian troops fresh from Belgium.

In his memoirs Hindenburg was to describe 8 August 1918 as the“black day” for the German army: “The battle ended on 4 April…What the English and the French had not been able to achieve,we accomplished in the fourth year of the war”.

Amiens, the cathedralVarious plaques commemorate theAustralian, Canadian, British,American, Newfoundland, SouthAfrican and New Zealand troops (on the pillars and walls of the southtransept) ; Low on the south wall ofthe choir, a plaque is dedicated tothe memory of Raymond Asquith,son of the British Prime Minister,who was killed at Ginchy in August1916. Two other plaques here com-memorate the colonial troops andthe soldiers of the parish of NotreDame who died for France ; The flagsof Australia, Canada, Newfoundland,New Zealand, the United States andSouth Africa hang in the chapel ofSaint James the Great in the apse.

Open every day :

- from 1/04 to 30/09:8.30 am - 6.30 pm

- from 1/10 to 31/03:8.30 am - 5.30 pm

AmiensThe memorial to the 2nd Australian DivisionThe original monument showed asoldier pinning an eagle to theground with his bayonet. Dismantledby the Germans in the Second WorldWar, it was replaced in September1971 with a less belligerent statue ;commemorative plaque presented byRoss Bastiaan.

Free open access at all times.

Péronne

On 28 August 1914 the retreating French army

passed through Péronne.

Evacuated by its inhabitants in 1916, the town was shelled by the French artillery during the Battle of the Somme. With the arrival of the British peacereturned to Péronne, the front line having shifted further east.

Péronne was abandoned by theGermans in March 1917 when they withdrew eastwards to theHindenburg Line. The town wasnext occupied by the British,who were driven out by theGerman offensive in March 1918.When the town was liberated bythe Australians in September itconsisted of nothing but ruins.

Pozières and Australia

A village in the state of

Queensland took the name

of Pozières after the war,

evidence of the evocative

power of the name for the

Australian people. In a further

example of this attachment,

a veteran of the First World

War threw a handful of earth

from Pozières on to the coffin

of the Unknown Australian

Soldier during the burial

service at the Australian War

Memorial at Canberra

on 11 November 1993.

The memorial to the 1st Australian Division “Gibraltar”Nothing now remains of this enormous 3-metre high blockhouse-observation point exceptits foundations. Now the property ofthe Conseil Général of the Somme,“Gibraltar” has been adapted togive a better understanding of thefighting here (orientation table atthe top with a look-out tower ;parking space ; information panels,picnic area, etc.).

The Tank MonumentThe four bronzes at the corners ofthis plain obelisk are small-scalemodels of the thanks that were usedin 1916-1918.

“The Windmill”A windmill stood here from as earlyas 1610, but during the First WorldWar a blockhouse was built herewhich has now almost entirelydisappeared. The grassy site nowbears a lead plaque, representing amemorial to the 2nd AustralianDivision, and a bench with theengraved dedication: “The Windmillat Pozières, of which you can see theremaining traces, lay at the heart ofthe battle which raged in July andAugust 1916 in this part of theBattle of the Somme. On 4 August1916 it was captured by Australiantroops but on this hill-top they lost more men than on any otherbattlefield throughout the war”.

Free open access at all times.

Pozières

The name of Pozières evokes two turning-points in the Battleof the Somme: the Australian troops' first major engagement

and the first use of tanks in a battlefield.

The failure to capture Thiepval by the west in the offensive of 1 July led to the British army’s move round the second Germanline, on Hill 160, by the south and therefore through Pozières.

This mission fell essentially to the Australians. From 23 July they captured the second line of the German positions and a large blockhouse (“Gibraltar”).

On 4 August the Australians reached the hill-top at altitude 160 m and took the remains of the blockhouses known as “The Windmill”. The Australians field of activity was triangular in outline, with its point at the very heavily fortified Mouquet(“Mucky”) Farm, where they were exhausted before being relievedby the Canadians. The British did not finally capture the farm until26 September. The farm has been rebuilt on a different site,but a plaque beside the D73 road recalls its original location.

On 15 September three tanks of the Canadian Division set outfrom Pozières with a sugar refinery as their objective (in modern times the Courcelette glass-houses). Only one tank reached the objective, the other two becoming bogged down.

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