Makes you think

We visited the battlefield of Verdun this afternoon. One of the bloodiest battles of the First World War, today the area is covered in woods. Dispersed through out the woods are bunkers and redoubts of scared and pitted concrete. There were over 300,000 casualties, 168,000 French and 148,000 German. It was the longest battle of the war, lasting 300 days and the sequels can still be seen today. The land is still cratered like a lunar landscape and the traces of the trenches are still there. There a villages that were completely destroyed and nothing but the name remains today. Even the farmers of the region are still digging up live artillery shells when they plow their fields.
However what really brought home the scale of the carnage is the cemetery of Douaumont where the 15000 crosses are perfectly lined up row on row. Under the monument is an ossuary where the skeletal remains of a further 130,000 unknowns are stored. After the war the people of Verdun located as many bodies as they could and brought them to the cemetery. Many were unknown, some were buried in mass graves and some were never buried but came to light at he end of the war as the land was cleaned up. Are there still soldiers unaccounted for in the area? Most probably since human remains are still being found here and there.
Needless to say it makes you think and I can tell you that I left there a lot more quietly than when I had arrived.

- Posted from my iPhone