In Flanders Fields, a Rendezvous with Death
Warning: Longish
The Inspiration
Between 8.5 and 9 million combat personnel died fighting World War I, aka “The Great War.” This grim cipher includes all combatants from all belligerent nations, but excludes non-fatal battle casualties (which were legion) as well as civilian casualties of all kinds. Here I purposefully focus on combat deaths in order to then provide the following breakdown: Of those, approximately 15,000 were airmen, whilst around 90,000 were seamen; the rest were land war fatalities. Put another way, at least 99% of the Great War’s combat dead were infantrymen and, to a lesser degree, artillery and tankmen.
It was for this reason, and casting no aspersions on my Great War group build compatriots who selected other noble themes, I chose to respond to my good friend Louis Gardner’s invitation with the challenge of creating a trench diorama. My contribution is transparently a tribute. Both of my grandfathers served in the Great War, one as an ambulance driver for the American Field Service, the other as a captain in a federally mobilized combat unit of the Missouri National Guard. Though I am certain they saw some very ugly things, they entered the war late and in a limited capacity. I have my doubts that they walked through the thick of it after the fashion of the millions who fought and died before they ever arrived. World War I was not, technically, the advent of trench warfare (the Siege of Petersburg in the final days of the American Civil War is often cited), but for all intents and purposes it might as well have been. It was a question of degree. The world had never seen hundreds of miles of trenches coupled with the kind of industrialized firepower that had only recently been developed. The resulting carnage shocked all involved parties, but not, of course, enough to stop the killing.
Above: Photos of barbed wire and trenches from my grandfather's personal collection
In truth, the hideous megaevent that was World War I is one of those global convulsions the expression of which transcends documentary record or even epic prose. Only poetry will do. For me, three poems come to mind. The first is ”In Flanders Fields" by Canadian John McCrae:
In Flanders fields, the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.
We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie,
In Flanders fields.
Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.
McCrae, a medical officer, died of pneumonia at Boulogne in January, 1918. His poem is almost certainly the most recognized of the War and iconized the poppy as Great Britain’s national symbol of honor for their gallant fallen (with all due respect to the cornflower, which is used in France and Belgium for the same purpose).
The second is “I Have a Rendezvous with Death” by Alan Seeger, an American who fought in the French Foreign Legion:
I have a rendezvous with Death
At some disputed barricade,
When Spring comes back with rustling shade
And apple-blossoms fill the air—
I have a rendezvous with Death
When Spring brings back blue days and fair.
It may be he shall take my hand
And lead me into his dark land
And close my eyes and quench my breath—
It may be I shall pass him still.
I have a rendezvous with Death
On some scarred slope of battered hill,
When Spring comes round again this year
And the first meadow-flowers appear.
God knows 'twere better to be deep
Pillowed in silk and scented down,
Where Love throbs out in blissful sleep,
Pulse nigh to pulse, and breath to breath,
Where hushed awakenings are dear ...
But I've a rendezvous with Death
At midnight in some flaming town,
When Spring trips north again this year,
And I to my pledged word am true,
I shall not fail that rendezvous.
Seeger kept his rendezvous, falling on July 4, 1916 at Belloy-en-Santerre during the Battle of the Somme, weapon in hand, charging enemy lines.
Lastly we read Carl Sandburg’s “Grass”:
Pile the bodies high at Austerlitz and Waterloo.
Shovel them under and let me work—
I am the grass; I cover all.
And pile them high at Gettysburg
And pile them high at Ypres and Verdun.
Shovel them under and let me work.,
Two years, ten years, and passengers ask the conductor:
What place is this?
Where are we now?
I am the grass.
Let me work.
Sandburg wrote “Grass” shortly after the end of the Great War. By it he rightly predicted that the horrific pathos of it all would inevitably be reduced to corroded historical plaques and monuments scattered across a countryside whose oblivious visitors unwittingly trivilize all the bravery and shattered hopes that unfolded there.
The Story
The build—my first posting here in over five years, and the first diorama I’ve built in forty-five—is my own feeble attempt at honoring the Great War’s brave dead. It’s a setting and a story repeated many, many times at places like Ypres, Verdun, and the Somme, among others. The fertile French farmland, once home to abundant crops and drowsy beasts, is now scarred by zigzagging trenches, row upon row of barbed wire, and artillery craters. An officer blows the whistle and you must rush from your trench and go “over the top” en masse in a patheic attempt to overwhelm, by sheer force of numbers, the lethality of the guns into which you charge. Taking some artistic license, my iteration depicts some forerunners cutting the barbed wire and laying down some covering fire to give you a slightly better chance. My backdrop is a montage of period photos through which we glimpe that world, that moment. The only real color to speak of in the whole scenario, the only life in the drab dirt-and-khaki world, is the red of McCrae’s Poppies and the green of Sanburg’s Grass, into which you charge. My soldiers are Brits and/or their Commonwealth compatriots, but they might be men of any army, for their rendezvous is not with any human foe but with Death himself.
The Kits
The build is a synthesis of 1:35 scale Great War figurines from two different kits (Master Box and Tamiya), a scratch-built base, and some aftermarket landscape materials. The backdrop is a prefab canvas board.
The two kits were comparable but I give the edge to Master Box for detail; the MB figurines are also slightly larger, but not enough to ruin the combination of the two on the same diorama. Master Box provided the kit for the trench itself, as well as a bunch of really cool accessories (tools, weapons) which were too many to use but gave me lots of options. For reference, the Master Box figures are the ones crowding the ladder in the trench, while the Tamiya figurines are the ones already “over the top,” with the exception of the figure in the officers cap. (I chose to exclude one MB officer figurine as redundant and ill-fitting for my chosen narrative.) I liked the figurines of both kits but my one critique of both is that neither provided shoulder straps for the Lee-Enfields, and wherever I look in the photographic record the weapons are never without them. I had grand plans to create my own but I reached the “call it done” stage and decided to let it go.
Aside from the sparing use of some artist colors for details, I painted with Tamiya acrylics and really wished I had had the money to spring for high quality enamels which to my memory blended so much better. Acrylics are OK if you are doing a solitary pilot who will be tucked in a cockpit (by far the bulk of my experience with figurine painting), but they’re lousy for a full project; that’s my position on the subject and I’m standing by it! I know oils are all the rage for top-notch figurine work, and doubtless would have been better, but that route was also too pricey and the thing took long enough as it was. It was a challenge and a test of will to produce nine figurines and keep the attention to quality and detail up, and I confess I walked away from it plenty of times just to keep my sanity.
The base I already posted as a WIP, and it consists of a cheap pine plaque that I stained, and some floral mounting Styrofoam. The “earth” is dirt from my garden, first sifted then run through a bullet blender to make it finer, and finally mixed with white glue and applied. The grass and the barbed wire are the aftermarket elements. I created the photo montage in such a way that I could then paste the whole on the canvas board, then paint a unified sky and the poppies.
So here is the build. I had hoped to have it ready for Remembrance/Armistice Day, and when that fell through I hoped for the Christmas Truce, but that also proved a bust. So January 31 will have to do, the 108th anniversary of Germany declaring to Washington that it would resume unrestricted submarine warfare, a move that ultimately broke American isolationist sentiments and brought the Yanks into the War. A special thanks to Louis @lgardner and all my fellow Great War GB compadres for humoring me and pulling me back in.
I don’t anticipate many more builds anytime soon, but this was worth it. Cheers!
Outstanding! I really enjoyed the Sandburg poem too.
Thanks, Robert. Yes, poetry and art are gifts to us that enable us to stab a bit closer to the heart of the matter. Poetry was far more popular then than it is now, and I think we've lost something.
This is nice work and very inspiring.
Thanks, Bill.
David A. Thomas (@davidathomas)
This is an incredible project. I'm so pleased that you accepted the invitation to the group, and even more so that you have completed this diorama. I can tell this had a lot of personal meaning for you. Your grandfathers are both smiling down at you right now for remembering and commemorating what they had to endure.
Good for you ! Never forget.
I firmly believe that today we live in a society where many people are too preoccupied and centered on themselves, not caring or thinking about what others have sacrificed (or endured), so that we can enjoy the freedom we have right now.
This little diorama brings things back into reality. It shows men, some of whom are about to meet their ultimate fate, only to be forgotten many years later by the ungrateful.
I have read the poem "In Flanders Fields" before. The others, "Grass" and "I have a rendezvous with death", are new to me, but just as poignant and sharp. This becomes even more true when you find out what happened to the authors.
These figures, the base, the barbed wire and soldier with the wire cutters are excellent. I like how you portrayed the backdrop too. Red Poppies and exploding air bursts, with soldiers in the background.
The icing on the cake is the personal connection and the pictures that belonged to your grand father.
We had several Great War "souvenirs" that were held by several of our family members. One was a Lee Enfield rifle that my Grand father had. It don't know what happened to it after he passed away. He also had several WW1 8MM German Mauser rifles, an American 03 Springfield 30.06 rifle, (which he used to go deer hunting with), various helmets and gas masks. This stuff has all since disappeared.
Then Grandpa's older sister had a WW1 German helmet that had a bullet hole exiting out of the back at an upward angle. You could tell the bullet had travelled upwards and exited through the top rear portion of the helmet when it was fired by the hole it left in the helmet. Her husband reportedly brought it back home with him when the War ended. According to family lore, her husband killed the German soldier who was wearing it, as he tried to jump into the trench with him. Her husband supposedly shot the German in the mouth and the bullet went out the top rear portion of his head . It was a case of "you or me".
My Grand father's sister didn't care too much for the helmet, so she used it to literally "slop the hogs" (feed her pigs) after her husband died. I have personally seen this helmet on several occasions when I was a kid. However, now it too has gone missing from what I have been told.
Thank you so very much for finishing this project up and posting it.
It looks magnificent and I have clicked on several of the various "like" buttons. Well done my friend. Your figure painting skills are excellent, much better than mine are by a long shot.
I have not been working on my various Great War projects, because I have a deadline to meet for the Cologne Panther project I have underway. It's due on March 6th. Then I have another one that is a family tribute build for a B-25J pilot that was lost in the Sulu Sea near Palawan, Philippines on April 8th, 1945. His body was never recovered and to this day he is still listed as MIA.
Once these two are completed, I will be back to work on my Great War subjects.
Thanks again for your continued support, and it's great to see you building and posting again. It's good to have you back.
Take care brother.
You're such a good friend, Louis. You've inspired me, and that was the only reason I jumped in on this one.
My paternal grandfather gave me a WW1 bayonet that he obtained through army surplus after the War. It had been ground down to serve as a shorter hunting knife. It had three notches in the handle, which made me and my brother pause. It, too, has been lost along the way.
Someday, we'll meet. Prayers for your family.
Excellent job and super result, David!
Thanks Spiros! Means a lot coming from you!
Well done, David. Very nice display for your tribute
Thanks Gary! You do such good work.
Devastating combination of images and words. The diorama is exceptional. Flanders Field was one I am familiar with. Grass and Rendezvous are new to me. Thanks for including them.
Cheers, Russell. I love your work, too, and if I had the time I'd be doing WW2 1:48's all the time! This is my first WW1 build.
An incredible diorama, David @davidathomas
A very interesting article as well with amazing pictures, thanks for sharing this.
Thanks, John. You do such fine work so it's an honor.
Really nice work - the "decisive moment" in reaction to the order "Over the top!" Everything's just right.
Thanks, Tom. Appreciate it!
Well done, David!
Thanks John
Incredible and poignant piece you’ve created here. Very powerful indeed. Thanks for sharing.
Thanks, Matt. You're a true master, so it means a lot.
A great diorama in honor of the soldiers at the Somme and Verdun, magnificently presented.
The poppy as a symbol of hope and that we never forget these terrible times. The same goes for the Second World War and the wars that followed. Because people have learned nothing from it, but it is still a sign of hope that we should not forget this.
Danke schön, Hans.