Mailly Wood Cemetery
1916 - 1918
Mailly-Maillet was within the line taken over from the French in the summer of 1915, and several Commonwealth cemeteries were made in the commune. Mailly Wood Cemetery was begun with the burial of thirteen men of the 2nd Seaforth Highlanders who died on 25 June 1916, and in November 1916, the 51st (Highland) Division buried in it following the capture of Beaumont Hamel. Thereafter, the cemetery was little used until April-August 1918, when the German attack on Amiens brought the front line very close, and further burials were made by the 12th Division (in May) and the 21st (in August), among others. After the Armistice graves from the battlefields immediately north-east of the village were brought into the cemetery, and 30 graves from Mailly Maillet Military Cemetery in the village itself. The cemetery now contains 702 burials and commemorations of the First World War. 672 British, 28 from New Zealand and 3 from South Afirca. 60 of the burials are unidentified and there are special memorials to two casualties whose graves in the cemetery could not be found, and to six whose graves in the military cemetery were destroyed by shell fire.
The following photograph shows the Seaforth Highlanders section.
All photographs in this section by Shirley Sutherland, Golspie
see also
Before the attack on Beaumont Hamel on 13th November 1916 the 5th Seaforths were billeted in Mailly-Maillet. After the battle they cleared their own dead of the battlefield and took them back to Mailly-Maillet which explains why there are so many identified Sutherland men in this cemetery.
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