Fromelles: French Flanders

Historian Peter Pedersen examines the World War I battle on the Western Front that decimated an Australian regiment in Fromelles: French Flanders . The attack at Fromelles is significant for a number of reasons. It was the Australians’ first major operation on the Western Front and pitted them against a part of the German line that was an object lesson in the siting of a defense. Before the battle, the Australian Gallipoli veterans had airily dismissed the fighting in the new theater as “pleasan