For visitors to Verdun's battlefields, the Memorial Museum is a good place
to start because the maps and graphics give
a clear idea of the scale of the battle, with
interactive exhibits and personal accounts.
The second floor looks at the conflict from
the German side and includes some rare
planes from the era.
Do not miss the terrace on the top floor
which gives a panoramic view of the
battlefields. You can also pick up helpful
maps and buy tickets to other World War
One sites.
Fleury-devant-Douaumont is a strange
place. At first glance it is peaceful, a place
where nature has taken over. But look
more carefully; these craters and hillocks
are the results of the fighting. Not a stone
left standing, not a single building. This
is how the village was left after the battle.
Today it is covered in neatly mown, bright
green grass, but imagine it as raw mud.
The small Chapelle Notre-Dame-de-l'Europe has been rebuilt, but that is all.
Footpaths wind through the hillocks
and in places the families have put signs
up showing where their houses used to
stand. There are some pieces of rusty,
twisted iron sticking out of the earth. This
is one of six so-called ‘martyr villages’ in
the département. The destruction was so
complete that rebuilding was never an
option. These villages are considered to
have died for France.
The Ossuary at Douaumont
From there, go to the Ossuary at
Douaumont, where the unidentified
human remains of an estimated 130,000
soldiers were interred. They are separated
into presumed battalions and regiments
according to the area from which they
were retrieved, meaning that grieving
families can lay flowers at burial places
which may well contain relevant
The Ossuary at DouaumontCécile Thouvenin
Bar-le-Duc and Verdun, which was the
main supply route for the frontline. After
March 1916, it was crammed with vehicles
night and day ferrying troops, armaments,
supplies, ambulances, and repair trucks.
All horse-drawn and pedestrian traffic
(including troop movements) was banned
from the road. The road had been widened
in 1915 making it two-way, and at any
given point a vehicle passed every 14
seconds. This meant that the road needed
constant maintenance by 16 labour
battalions. Railway access to Verdun had
already been destroyed by the Germans in
1914, so the work was vital.
A narrow-gauge single track railway
ran beside the road, moving 1,800 tonnes
of supplies a day, including food for
16,000 officers, 420,000 men, and 136,000
horses. During the summer of 1916 this
was upgraded to a standard gauge railway
connected to the regional network.
