Azannes II

Photographs: Fritz Braun Département Meuse 4,750 German war dead First World War The German military cemetery Azannes II was established by their own troops at the beginning of the Battle of Verdun in early March 1916, when the front had shifted a few kilometers to the south after the first successes of the German offensive. At this time, the medical units also advanced further and set up several military hospitals and main dressing stations in Azannes, one of which was in a small wood above the current military cemetery. This treated almost 3,500 wounded in the period from April 7-27, 1916 alone. Those who succumbed to their serious injuries were the first to find their final resting place in the cemetery grounds. When the war ended in November 1918, there were around 800 graves. After the end of the war, the French military authorities considerably enlarged the cemetery by adding hundreds of fallen soldiers, which were found during the clearing and recultivation work that began on the abandoned battlefield in 1920. Even today, the remains of the dead are still being recovered during construction and forestry work. Those who were buried there came from almost all the focal points of the battle: Samogneux, Thiaumont, Vaux, Romagne-s/s-les Côtes, Fleury, Douaumont. Beaumont, "Dead Man", Height 304, Avocourt - in total from 145 communes or districts. Those resting in Azannes II (the Azannes I cemetery is located directly on the western edge of the village) belonged to units whose home garrisons were in Bavaria, Hesse, Saxony. The first work to improve the condition of the cemetery was carried out by the Volksbund Deutsche Kriegsgräberfürsorge e.V. (German War Graves Commission) on the basis of an agreement reached with the French military authorities in 1926. This included extensive planting of trees, shrubs and hedges. In the winter of 1927/28 alone, 146 plane trees were planted. The communal grave - still located behind the high cross - was given a natural stone border. The high cross is made of red Vosges sandstone. The entrance was also designed with a forged gate between two monolithic blocks of stone. However, the problem of permanently marking the graves remained unresolved due to a lack of foreign currency and the outbreak of the Second World War in 1939. Final design Following the conclusion of the Franco-German War Graves Agreement of 19 July 1966, the Volksbund Deutsche Kriegsgräberfürsorge e.V. - with financial support from the German government - was able to carry out the final design of the German military cemeteries of the First World War in France. Prior to this, young volunteers from the Volksbund had already begun extensive preparatory gardening work. In 1977, the previous temporary wooden grave markers were replaced with metal crosses with the names and dates of those buried here cast into them. Previously, young helpers had moved the 35 kg concrete foundations, which were transported by the German army, to the graves. 4,594 of the 4,750 fallen rest in individual graves. Of these, 839 remain unknown. Of the 156 dead in the common grave, 87 remain unknown. For religious reasons, the 18 graves of the fallen of the Jewish faith were marked with a natural stone grave stele instead of a cross, the Hebrew characters of which read: 1. (above): "Here rests buried ... ." 2. (below): "May his soul be bound into the circle of the living." The cemetery was then given a new enclosure consisting of a fence and hedge; trees and shrubs were replaced and the graves were re-landscaped. Today, metal name plaques commemorate the known dead of the common grave.