DESTROYED BRIDGE ACROSS THE BASSÉE
For four years the fighting never ceased in this region. Leave the Festubert sector on the right. Throughout the struggle, the Canadians fought so bravely that one of their recruiting posters was dedicated to the heroes of Festubert, with this inscription:
"Oui, vous avez raison, c'est hideux le carnage,
Oui, le progrès blessé recule et se débat,
Notre siècle en fureur retourne au moyen âge,
Mais sachons donc nous battre, au moins, puisqu'on se bat."
At the crossing of N. 41 and 43 leave the latter on the right.
Cross the Grande Rue d'Annequin. From here, on the right, coalpit No. 9 can be seen, with its wrecked machinery in the air—a mass of twisted ironwork.
The ruined village of Cambrin is next passed through. On the other side of the level-crossing, leave on the right the badly damaged village of Auchy-lez-La-Bassée. The road now follows the canal. After crossing the railway (l. c.) vast heaps of broken railway trucks smashed by the shells can be seen in the fields on the right. Further on are eight or nine blockhouses which were formerly brick-kilns. Turn to the left, cross the railway, then the Aire Canal by the new suspension bridge (beside the old one shown in the photograph) and enter La Bassée, now a heap of ruins.
La Bassée, an important centre standing at the junction of several roads and railways, in the heart of the plain of Flanders, south-west of Lille, was the objective of many desperate struggles during the war.
In October, 1914, the district of La Bassée was the scene of endless conflicts between the Allied and enemy cavalry forces, the little town finally remaining in the hands of the Germans.
A year later, the British offensive in Artois drove back the Germans south of La Bassée, whilst to the north the positions of Neuve-Chapelle and Aubers were bitterly disputed. However, the lines shifted but little, and La Bassée still remained in the centre of the line of fire.