Vieil Armand or HartmannswillerkopfOne of Alsace's World War One Memorials
One of the lesser known World War One memorials is... Hartmannswillerkopf also known as "Vieil Armand" and "HWK" or "HK" It was a World War One battlefield in Alsace... It's unique because it's one of the very few World War One memorials and battlefields in the mountains... Which means most of the trenches were either built out of stone or carved directly into the rock. So you can actually see and... Walk around in the very well preserved World War One trenches. We spent almost an entire day walking around in the World War One trenches there and... I doubt we saw them all. That's just how much is still there!
What Happened at Hartmannswillerkopf?At Hartmannswillerkopf (or Vieil Armand) there is a pretty good view of Alsace and the surrounding area... So after war broke out... The French set themselves up at Hartmannswillerkopf so that they could keep track of what the Germans were up to... Remember that Alsace at the time was part of Germany so the Vosges mountain range was the France-Germany border then. Well the Germans wanted to see what the French were up to as well so... They set themselves up at Hartmannswillerkopf too. That's when it turned into a fight for the summit on December 30, 1914. For most of 1915 the French and the Germans attempted to take over the mountain... And they both succeeded... Except that when the French managed to push the Germans back, the Germans would then somehow manage to push the French back to where they were before... And vice versa... And this continued throughout 1915... January 8, 1916 was the last major attempt to take the summit of Hartmannswillerkopf. After that, the battle front in Alsace didn't move much... Both sides continued to attack the other side but only with grenades, shells, and machine guns... There were no more men charging into no man's land for the next three years which is one of the reasons these first world war trenches are in such good shape... The battle front didn't move for three years and... People were living in the trenches for three years. Approximately 30,000 men are estimated to have died at Hartmannswillerkopf.
Hiking around HartmannswillerkopfThis is one of the few World War one memorials in the mountains, so wear your hiking shoes and wear clothing that will cover your legs. Especially in the summer... They do cut back some of the plants growing naturally around the trenches but it just grows back. The memorial building itself is open from April to the beginning of November. Technically the rest of the memorial site is open year round but... It is in the mountains... So I wouldn't go up there until April or later because it's likely that there will be snow and ice. Personally, I think the spring is a great time to go hiking at Vieil Armand because you can see the trenches better (less plants growing around them) and there are fewer people... Also there is a little restaurant next to the World War One memorial if you want to sit down and have some hot food or... You can do what a lot of people do and... Bring a packed lunch with you and eat it wherever you want and whenever you want. The summit (where the really big white cross is...) is a nice area to have a picnic.
How do I Get to Hartmannswillerkopf
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