Whilst travelling around Northern France, you see daily reminders of the suffering & horror that was experienced by many.
One of the things that serves as a constant reminder to many farmers in this area is referred to as the Iron Harvest. This is when all sorts of 'leftovers', such as shell cases, bullets & even 'live' munitions are trawled to the surface, usually as farmers are ploughing fields.
This is a 'live' shell, although it is probably a dud, people are advised to leave them 'well alone'. We found this one just at the edge of a field - we didn't kick it.........:
Another example is this grenade we spotted at the side of a farm track:
Opened on 31 July 1932 by the Prince of Wales, the Thiepval memorial was and remains the largest British war memorial in the world. The memorial contains the names of 73,357 British and South African men who have no known grave and who fell on the Somme between July 1916 and 20 March 1918:
The 'products' of one man's 'iron harvest' - these are empty shell casings. They are just stacked up in the garden of a farm house next to the road:
Just two of the many, many military cemetries that can be found in Europe. The foreground headstones are British & the Crosses in the background are French:
Lest We Forget:
Cheers,
TSC.
