Home / Family & Friends / Erynn's Family / Visiting European War Memorials with David - Nov 2013 / Ypres

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November 16, 2013
Ypres hosted some of the fiercest fighting during the war. Hundreds of thousands of British Commonwealth soldiers gave their life here defending the city. During the battle a young doctor penned the most famous war poem called "In Flanders Fields". The author John McCrae is a distance relative to our kids. A 5x great uncle.
The other amazing thing that happens in the city is that every night a town organization, the Last Post Association, blows the Last Post bugle call at Menin Gate every night at 8pm. In fact they have done it every single night since 1927 to honor those Commonwealth soldiers that gave their life to defend their city. The gate lists the names of nearly 55,000 soldiers who died, but whose bodies were never identified.