 |
Yorkshire
Regiment War Graves, - Dunkirk Town Cemetery, France |
|
View of Dunkirk Town Cemetery with Private Smith's grave 5th from the right
on the front row, and the Dunkirk Memorial in the background.
Photo : Richard Roberts (<richard.nsw@googlemail.com>)
Dunkirk witnessed the landing of the British Expeditionary Force in September and October 1914. Throughout the First World War it was a seaplane base and later an American Naval Air Service base. The town was also a French hospital centre and the 8th Canadian Stationary Hospital was there from November 1918 to April 1919. Although an estimated 7,500 shells and bombs fell on the town during the war, ship building and other port activities continued.
During the Second World War, Dunkirk was the scene of the historic evacuation of the British Expeditionary Force from France in May 1940.
DUNKIRK TOWN CEMETERY contains 460 Commonwealth burials of the First World War, ten of them unidentified. The graves are situated in Plots 1 to 3 in the public part of the cemetery to the right of the main entrance, and in Plots 4 and 5 of the Commonwealth War Graves section adjacent to the Dunkirk Memorial.
Of the 793 Second World War burials, 213 are unidentified and special memorials are erected to 58 soldiers known to be buried among them. These graves are in Plots 1 and 2 of the section by the Dunkirk Memorial. There are also Czech, Norwegian and Polish war graves within the Commonwealth section, and war graves of other nationalities will be found elsewhere within the cemetery.
The DUNKIRK MEMORIAL stands a the entrance to the Commonwealth War Graves
section of Dunkirk Town Cemetery. It commemorates more than 4,500 casualties
of the British Expeditionary Force who died in the campaign of 1939-40 and
who have no known grave.
Amongst the graves is 1 for a soldier of the Yorkshire Regiment.
We are extremely grateful to Richard Roberts (<richard.nsw@googlemail.com>) who has provided the photo of Private Smith's headstone, and the photos of the Dunkirk Town Cemetery.
 Select
the above image for a larger version which opens in a new window. |
Private Sydney Smith. 275656. 10th Battalion the Yorkshire Regiment transferred to (377920) 769th Coy. Labour Corps. Son of Mrs. K. A. Smith, of 19, Victor St., Oak Lane, Bradford, Yorks. Died 21 February 1919. Aged 22. |
-------------> Return to the Top of the Page
View looking back towards the Cemetery from part of the Dunkirk Memorial site.
Photo : Richard Roberts (<richard.nsw@googlemail.com>)