Postcard map of the English Channel, the strait between England and France with the Channel Ports of Dunkirk and Calais in France and Dover and the mouth of the Thames River in England. Illustration by Eugen Felle, 1915.
Westlicher Kriegsschauplatz: Der KanalWestern Front: the (English) ChannelReverse:Der Kanal.7 Januar. [1915] Deutscher Fliegerangriff auf Dünkirchen. 10. Januar: Deutsches Fluggeschwader über der Themsemündung. 13. Januar.: Deutsche Unterseeboote am Hafeneingang von Dover. 22. Januar.: Deutsche Unterseeboote eröffnen die Blokade im Kanal. 28. Januar.: Erfolgreiche Fliegerangriffe auf die englischen Militäranlagen in Dünkirchen.The Channel.January 7. [1915] German air raid on Dunkirk. 10th January: German air squadron over the Thames estuary. 13th January:. German submarines in the harbor entrance of Dover. 22nd January:. German submarine inaugurates a blockade of the Channel. 28th January:. Successful air raids on the British military units in Dunkirk.Kunstverlag Eug. Felle, Isny, Wttbg. Nr. 25.Art publisher Eug. Felle, Isny, Wittenburg. No. 25
". . . there was no more ground to lose in Flanders. Mount Kemmel is only twenty-five miles from Dunkirk, and it commands the whole plain stretching up to that town. . . .I did not succeed, however, in preventing the British front in the Ypres salient from being moved back, on April 27th, to the walls of the city, with, as a consequence, the withdrawal of the Belgian front to the Yperlée Canal. . . .I was now struck with the enormous wastage among the Allied troops, subjected as they had been to incessant attacks and bombardment by a prodigious number of gas shells. In order to meet this situation, I ordered three more French divisions (the 32nd, 129th, and 168th ) to be sent to Flanders; a part of these would be used to relieve the British XXII Corps, which had reached the extreme limit of endurance."
Allied Commmander-in-Chief Ferdinand Foch on the great losses of the British forces in March and April, 1918. German commander Erich Ludendorff's 1918 drive for victory began on March 21 with Operation Michael, an attack north and south of the Somme River. In April he moved north to the Lys River on the Franco-Belgian border with Operation Georgette, the Battle of the Lys, began on April 9 on the Lys River along the Franco-Belgian border in Flanders. Both sectors were held by the British. French reserves reinforced the British line after it had been driven back with heavy losses on the Lys, but could not hold Mount Kemmel, losing it on the 25th, adding failure to British criticism that they had moved too slowly to support their ally. General Douglas Haig's impulse was to save the British Army by falling back to the Channel ports of Dunkirk and Calais. The British had held Ypres since the First Battle of Ypres in 1914.
The Memoirs of Marshal Foch, translated by Col. T. Bentley Mott by Ferdinand Foch, pp. 298–299, copyright © 1931 by Doubleday, Doran & Company, Inc., publisher: Doubleday, Doran & Co., publication date: 1931
1918-04-27, 1918, April, Flanders, Mount Kemmel, Kemmel, Mt. Kemmel, the Channel Ports, Channel Ports
