CWGC Cemetery: OUTTERSTEENE COMMUNAL CEMETERY EXTENSION, BAILLEUL

Visiting Information

Wheelchair access possible to this cemetery via main entrance. For further information regarding wheelchair access, please contact our Enquiries Section on 01628 507200.

Local Information

Outtersteene is a village about 5 kilometres south-west of Bailleul. The Communal Cemetery Extension is north-east of the village on the road to Bailleul. From Bailleul follow the D.23 to Outtersteene, the cemetery is on the right hand side of the road just as you approach the outskirts of the town.

Historical Information

Outtersteene was captured by the III Corps on 13 October 1914 but no Commonwealth burials took place there for nearly three years. In August 1917, during the Third Battle of Ypres, the 2nd, 53rd and 1st Australian Casualty Clearing Stations came to Outtersteene, and the first and last of these remained until March 1918. The hamlet was captured by the Germans on 12 April 1918, and retaken by the 9th, 29th and 31st Divisions, with the ridge beyond it, on 18 and 19 August, but the cemetery was not used again during hostilities. After the Armistice, graves were brought into the cemetery extension from the battlefields surrounding Outtersteene and from certain small cemeteries. The extension was used again in 1940, for the burial of those killed in the fighting which covered the withdrawal of the British Expeditionary Force to Dunkirk. Outtersteene Communal Cemetery Extension now contains 1,393 Commonwealth burials and commemorations of the First World War. 499 of the burials are unidentified but there are special memorials to 14 casualties known or believed to be buried among them. Second World War burials number 72, of which 23 are unidentified. The extension was designed by Sir Herbert Baker.