“The Hartmannswillerkopf was a very valuable position. This position sums up the whole history of the fortification of the countryside during the war ”, writes Captain Luguet after the armistice.
From the top of its 956 meters, the Hartmannswillerkopf indeed overlooks the plain of Alsace, in the Haut-Rhin. Strategic, it is the subject of bloody battles. And causes the loss of 30,000 French and German soldiers (killed, wounded, missing). In a horror hardly conceivable today.
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Attacks and counterattacks
In 1914, Alsace was annexed to Germany, following the French defeat in the war of 1870. So was the Hartmannswillerkopf.
French troops attacked this summit from the start of the war. After several attempts, and already many victims, the mountain was conquered by the French in March 1915.
The success made the headlines of Parisian newspapers.
But the Germans react and counter-attack. In 1915 alone, the summit changed sides four times. The almost incessant bombardments forced the men to hide in makeshift shelters built on the spot.
The Hartmannswillerkopf is deforested, because of the deluge of iron which falls on the mountain. No tree has its top yet. A spectacle of desolation. Daily terror.
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Shells, gas, flamethrowers and the smell of death
To protect themselves and try to keep their positions, soldiers from both sides dig trenches. Build rock shelters. And concrete protections.
The Germans even built a cable car to transport materials and men up the mountain.
All this while trying to avoid enemy attacks. In the cold and the snow, throughout the long winter season.
Shells, gases and flamethrowers are the everyday life of soldiers. Who live in the scent of death. Because it is often impossible to bury the victims.
Nothing to envy the hell of Verdun …
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High place of memory
This bloody battlefield, called “Mountain of the Dead” by the Poilus, has today become a high place of memory. Classified as historical monuments. You can still see shelters, fortifications, trenches …
One of the four national monuments of the Great War is built there, inaugurated by President Albert Lebrun in 1932.
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A monument in two parts. An altar of the fatherland stands in the center of a large square. Under this altar, a crypt which is accessed by an 80-meter alley, reminiscent of a trench. It houses an ossuary with the remains of unidentified soldiers.
Nearby, the Franco-German Historial is much more recent. This exhibition space, opened in 2017, offers a global vision of the First World War. And a message of hope and union between peoples. Under the sign of Franco-German friendship.
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