The Ypres League and the Commemoration of the Ypres Salient, 1914—1940

Abstract

This article explores British visions of Ypres between 1914 and 1940, and concentrates on the work of the crucial interwar remembrance movement, the Ypres League. The city of Ypres became a crucial symbol of all Britain was fighting for during the course of the First World War, and rapidly developed a holy aura. Led by the league, the horrors of industrial warfare were commuted into a spiritual quest in which British and imperial troops were purified by their experiences in the Ypres salient. After the war, British people visited Ypres in large numbers in order to imagine the sufferings of the servicemen and gain a spiritual benefit often with the assistance of the Ypres League and its publications. This reflected a culture of high diction and ritual greatly at odds with the idea that the twenties and thirties saw the dawn of an age disillusioned with the values of 1914. The British also became resident in Ypres in considerable numbers, and the article explores the relationship between the local population and the immigrants. By exploring the nature of war commemoration through the detailed case study of one particular site, it is intended to deepen the historiography of commemoration studies.