St. Eloi was part of the Flanders front, near Ypres.

Ypres, and the surrounding region and province known as Flanders, was synonymous with the British Expeditionary Force during World War I. Ypres was historically one of Belgium’s most important cities, being a key economic powerhouse in the region, especially in the textile industry. While the city in scope of size and importance had dropped by 1914, it was still an important regional marketplace. The fighting around Ypres had ground the city into rubble by the war’s end.

In 1914, the professional, hardened British Army clashed with the green German Army in this corner of Belgium, in the First Battle of Ypres (October 19-November 22, 1914). German forces slammed into the British again and again. The small British professional army, with famous names like the Coldstream Guards, Black Watch, and the Connaught Rangers, was decimated, requiring a flood of British volunteers to fill the ranks. The British were successful; they held off the Germans, but were now locked in place, squeezed into a salient.

That was the beginning.