THE NEW YPRES

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume XVIII, Issue 200, 7 August 1928, Page 6

THE NEW YPRES

PILGRIMS ASTOUNDED MEMORIES OF WAR DAYS REVIEWED. EX-SOLDIERS COMPARE NOTES. (United Press Association—By Cable— Copyright.] [Australian and N.Z. Press Assn.) London, Aug. 5. “Ypres has become the heauquarters of thousands of men trying io keep an emotional appointment with the past; men who had not seen the Ypres sector since the war, gazing there to-day were dazed to stupefaction; some were on the verge of tears when they saw it,” says the “Sunday Express’” correspondent.

“Nature has emooothed out man’s insanity. Ground which was fallowed for four years and ploughed by the guns of Europe is now bearing tao richest crops in its history. Many exsoldiers stood on the site of old dug outs and wondered whether it was all a dream. They were comparing notes sitting in cafes in the Grand Place telling how they went to seek the old headquarter and found shops selling camisoles and silk nighties, and even cheap little vulgar shops which had sprung up selling souvenirs of the Great War. Hell Fire Corner has become a tidy little farm with chickens running about. The pilgrims, including over 1000 mothers, widows and fiancees of soldiers, headed by Lady Haig, were bewildered by the new Ypres town. “Hill 60 is little changed and the past is easily recallable. Vimy Bidge, thanks to the Canadian Government is exactly as it was. Thiepval is still a place of skeleton trees. “Occasionally muddy buttons and badges are proodded up but pilgrims seeking memories are finding them until their hearts ache lying in white rows in the cemeteries,.like battailous on parade in lovely places with green turf and flowers. Though these bring heartaches, there is peace, but beauty there is locked away from the world’s sorrows in the earth, which is ‘for ever England.”