German postcard map of the Western Front in Flanders, looking south and including Lille, Arras, Calais, and Ostend. In the Battle of the Yser in October, 1914, the Belgian Army held the territory south of the Yser Canal, visible between Nieuport, Dixmude, and Ypres (Ypern). Further north is Passchendaele, which British forces took at great cost in 1917.
Der KanalStraße von CalaisThe English Channel and the Strait of CalaisReverse:Panorama des westlichen Kriegsschauplatzes 1914/15 Von Arras bis Ostende.Die Panorama-Postkartenreihe umfaßt mit ihren 9 Abschnitten Nr. 400 bis 408 den gesamten westlichen Kriegsschauplatz von der Schweizer Grenze bis zur Nordseeküste.Panorama of the western theater of operations 1914/15 from Arras to Ostend. The panoramic postcard series includes nine sections, with their No. 400-408 the entire western battlefield from the Swiss border to the North Sea coast.Nr. 408Wenau-Postkarte Patentamtl. gesch.
". . . the remainder of the [Prussian] Guardsmen fled back into the wood, little knowing that the weak parties that had stopped them were the last line of British resistance.[Footnote to above:] A wounded German officer captured on the western side of the [Nonne Bosschen] wood actually asked a battery commander 'where are your reserves?' The answer was to point to the line of the guns. Obviously disbelieving, the German then said 'what is there behind? and on getting the reply 'divisional headquarters' he exclaimed from the depths of his heart, in German, 'God Almighty!'"
After a major German assault on the Ypres salient on October 31, 1914, the French and British believed the Germans were spent, and would concentrate on the Eastern Front to halt a Russian advance. They were wrong, and the Germans were preparing another massive assault for November 10. Delayed by poor weather, it broke on the French and British the next day. The Allies held, solidifying the Western Front that ran from Switzerland to the North Sea. The war would last four more years.
Military Operations France and Belgium, 1914, Vol. II, October-November by J. E. Edmonds, page 439, copyright © asserted, publisher: MacMillan and Co., Limited, publication date: 1925
1914-11-11, November, 1914, Battle of Ypres, Edmonds, J. E. Edmonds, Ypres
