Hello, I understand that some burials are under hurried conditions hence how or rather where they are buried. However at this cemetery the PPCLI soldiers are buried in a block pointing in a completely different direction to the concentrations graves around them, why is this? Cheers Soren First World War.com - The Western Front Today - Voormezeele Enclosure No. 3
Soren. Are you able to give the inscription on the memorial stone (can't make it out from the pic) and maybe id the graves? This might give a clue as to why. Pete
There is a separate PPCLI plot in this cemetery which pre-dates all other burials. That plot includes two men who commanded the battalion.
Does this help from CWGC website CWGC - Cemetery Details The Voormizeele Enclosures (at one time there were a total of four, but now reduced to three) were originally regimental groups of graves, begun very early in the First World War and gradually increased until the village and the cemeteries were captured by the Germans after very heavy fighting on 29 April 1918. Voormezeele Enclosure No.3, the largest of these burial grounds, was begun by the Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry in February 1915. Their graves are in Plot III, the other Plots from I to IX are the work of other units, or pairs of units, and include a few graves of October 1918. Plots X and XII are of a more general character. Plots XIII to XVI were made after the Armistice when graves were brought in from isolated sites and smaller cemeteries to replace the French graves (of April and September 1918) that were removed to a French cemetery. These concentrated graves cover the months from January 1915 to October 1918, and they include those of many men of the 15th Hampshires and other units who recaptured this ground early in September 1918. There are now 1,611 Commonwealth servicemen of the First World War buried or commemorated in Voormezeele Enclosure No.3. 609 of the burials are unidentified but there are special memorials to 15 casualties known or believed to be buried among them. Other special memorials record the names of five casualties whose graves in PHEASANT WOOD CEMETERY could not be found on concentration. The cemetery was designed by Sir Edwin Lutyens.
