The Newfoundland Caribou and the Trenches - vintage version

The Newfoundland Caribou and the Trenches. Vintage version.... more

by Weston Westmoreland

Title

The Newfoundland Caribou and the Trenches - vintage version

Artist

Weston Westmoreland

Medium

Photograph

Description

The Newfoundland Caribou and the Trenches. Vintage version.

Newfoundland has always been a demanding place to live. Scarcely populated, at the time of the Great War the Newfounlanders were about 200,000 souls. Their biggest city was inhabited by about 5,000 people. Nevertheless they managed to form a battalion and sent it to war. These men were together for two years, friends of old, relatives, neighbors... they belonged to a close-knitted community, and those two years got them even closer.

Their first serious war engagement for them came the first day of the battle of the Somme, on the first of July, 1916. Thirty minutes after the order to go over the top was issued, less than 70 of the over 700 young men that were to fight that day remained alive.

Beaumont-Hamel is where it happened. Five years later, the Newfounlanders gathered money and bought that land to honor their fallen. Today, their symbol, the Caribou, watchers over the place of their sacrifice, in one of the most moving memorials to visit, and one of the best preserved front lines of those terrible times.

There is a version of this image without the texture.


You can learn more about what drives me in my blog:

http://inspiringthoughtsandimages.com/

Weston Westmoreland.

Uploaded

September 17th, 2016