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Webmatters : Nécropole nationale de Lihons

Lihons French National Cemetery

Location

Lihons is a village and commune in the Department of the Somme on the road from Amiens to Nesle. The French National Cemetery is on the north side of this road and on the west side of the Bois Crepey.

GPSNEOSM
Decimal49.8278932.747891 Map
Lihons French Military Cemetery

Historical Information

This area forms part of the front attacked by the French during the Battle of the Somme, launched on 1st July 1916. The area passed into the control of the British in 1917 before being retaken by the Germans during their Spring Offensive of 1918. Lihons was liberated (again) during the Battle of Amiens, launched on 8th August 1918.

The Cemetery was begun (as the Cimetière des Pommiers) in January 1915, and enlarged after the Armistice by concentrations from the battlefields and from other Military Cemeteries.

One of the ossuaries

It contains the graves of 6,587 French soldiers (many of whom fell in August 1914), and those of five soldiers from the United Kingdom and one from Canada who fell in March and August 1918. Two of the British graves are unnamed.

1,671 of the French burials are contained in two large ossuaries to the rear of the cemetery.

Alan Seeger

The American poet Alan Seeger

The American poet, Alan Seeger, who served with the French Foreign Legion is believed to be one of those interred in Ossuary No 1 though his body was never formally identified as the grave had been destroyed in later shelling.

He was killed in fighting at Belloy en Santerre on the 4th July 1916.

On the opening day of the battle he wrote his poem : I have a rendezvous with death.

I have a rendezvous with Death
At some disputed barricade,
When Spring comes back with rustling shade
And apple-blossoms fill the air —
I have a rendezvous with Death
When Spring brings back blue days and fair.

The Legion lost 869 men during the fighting about a third of their effective strength. Many of them including Commandant Ruelland (Commanding the 1st Battalion) are buried in Marcelcave.

Ossuary No 1

Ossuary No 1


Soldat Jules Talandier

Soldat Jules Talandier 197
333e Régiment d’Infanterie
Died on 5th September 1916 aged 32

Grave: 497

Sergent Suleyman Diakite

Sergent Suleyman Diakite
70e Tirailleurs sénégalais
Died on 19th August 1916

Grave: 978

Caporal Maurice Lambin

Caporal Maurice Lambin 1535
23e Régiment d’Infanterie coloniale
Died on 20th July 1916 aged 26

Grave: 2060

Private Charles Painter

Private Charles Painter 108698
Machine Gun Corps
Died on 30th March 1918

Grave: 544

Private Emerson Gates

Private Emerson Gates 283138
85th Bn Canadian Infantry
Died on 10th August 1918 aged 22
Son of Silas and Mary Gates
of Port Williams, King’s Co., Nova Scotia

Grave: 425

Private James Steele

Private James Steele 32052
17th Bn Lancashire Fusiliers
Died on 23rd February 1917 aged 34
Son of Mrs. James Steele
of 20, Glamis Rd., Forfar
Husband of Mary Christie Steele
of 46, Dundee Rd., Forfar

Grave: 184


Other cemeteries in the area