Situated on key points of the battlefield they memorialize, the central feature of the memorials would be a 13 tonne cube-shaped block of white-grey granite quarried near Stanstead Quebec. The blocks are essentially identical, carved with wreathes on two opposing sides and inscribed with the phrase "HONOUR TO THE CANADIANS WHO ON THE FIELDS OF FLANDERS AND FRANCE FOUGHT IN THE CAUSE OF THE ALLIES WITH SACRIFICE AND DEVOTION" around the base. Though uniform in design, they are differentiated in the brief English and French descriptions of the battle they commemorate inscribed on their sides and the small parks that surround the memorial blocks, which vary in shape and layout. The Bourlon Wood Canadian Memorial it is located adjacent to the town of Bourlon, about west of Cambrai, France, and was the site of a strategic German strong point in an elevated location, concealed in the forest which was obliterated in the fighting. One British soldier, who had to bivouac in the area not long after the ferocious battle, recalled, "It wasn't much like a wood, more like a lot of crooked matchsticks stuck in the ground". Location and design The memorial site is situated on land donated by the Comte de Franqueville, the Mayor of Bourlon at the War's end. It is found at the end of the 'Avenue du Bois' in the southeastern corner of the village of Bourlon. The park is a beautiful series of terraces lined with ancient lime trees that were nursed back to health after having been shattered by shellfire during the battle for Bourlon Wood. Two parallel paths ascend from the base up to a plateau on the hilltop where the Canadian granite block monument is set in a glade of lawn upon a low circular flagstone terrace. Through the trees, the view from the top of the site looks back over the former battlefields that approached Bourlon, across which the Canadians advanced through August and September 1918, and Vimy Ridge can be seen on the northwestern horizon. At Bourlon Wood, the inscription on the monument reads: THE CANADIAN CORPSON 27TH SEP. 1918 FORCEDTHE CANAL DU NORD ANDCAPTURED THIS HILL.THEY TOOK CAMBRAI,DENAIN, VALENCIENNES& MONS; THEN MARCHEDTO THE RHINE WITHTHE VICTORIOUS ALLIES Images External links Bourlon Wood Memorial - Veteran's Affairs Canada References Military history of Canada Canadian military memorials and cemeteries Canada in World War I World War I memorials in France