page_title: Roclincourt
section_title: World War I
hierarchical_section_title: Roclincourt / History / World War I
caption_attribution_description: English: A Digital Photograph of Roclincourt by M Hobbs
context_page_description: Roclincourt is a commune in the Pas-de-Calais department in northern France.
context_section_description: Roclincourt found itself uncomfortably close to most of the fighting during World War I, with tragic consequences for the village. During the opening years of the war, the nearby trenches were manned by French troops of the 10th Army. In February 1916, the 10th army was sent to reinforce Verdun, which had been under heavy attack by the Germans. In its place in the Roclincourt sector, British troops of 5th Division, 95th Brigade were sent in, namely the 1st Battalion of the Devonshire Regiment, who rotated every three days with the 1st Battalion of the East Surrey Regiment. The British troops were surprised and not pleased to find the trenches along this sector to be in a very poor condition. The parapets were in a very poor state and there were insufficient firing platforms. It took these two battalions some time to get the trenches back up to a good standard. On the plus side, the area had become relatively quiet, although there was a campaign of mining and counter-mining. To this day, craters can still be found along the line of the front in this area. The line suffered from occasional bombardments from the German lines. Both the Devonshires and the East Surreys suffered casualties due to these bombardments and members of both regiments can be found in the cemeteries around Roclincourt and Arras.
  During World War I the village was very close to the front and by the end of the conflict it had been completely destroyed. The village was then rebuilt.
caption: Front line to the northeast of the village
exif: {"Image ImageDescription": "OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA", "Image Make": "OLYMPUS IMAGING CORP.", "Image Model": "X600,D630,FE5500", "Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image XResolution": "314", "Image YResolution": "314", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "Version 1.01", "Image DateTime": "2006:12:08 11:04:51", "Image YCbCrPositioning": "Co-sited", "Image ExifOffset": "158", "Image PrintIM": "[80, 114, 105, 110, 116, 73, 77, 0, 48, 51, 48, 48, 0, 0, 37, 0, 1, 0, 20, 0, ... ]", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "1748", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "6224", "EXIF ExposureTime": "49/5000", "EXIF FNumber": "14/5", "EXIF ExposureProgram": "Program Normal", "EXIF ISOSpeedRatings": "64", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0221", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2006:12:08 11:04:51", "EXIF DateTimeDigitized": "2006:12:08 11:04:51", "EXIF ComponentsConfiguration": "YCbCr", "EXIF ExposureBiasValue": "0", "EXIF MaxApertureValue": "3", "EXIF MeteringMode": "CenterWeightedAverage", "EXIF LightSource": "Unknown", "EXIF Flash": "Flash did not fire, auto mode", "EXIF FocalLength": "29/5", "EXIF FlashPixVersion": "0100", "EXIF ColorSpace": "sRGB", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "2560", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "1920", "Interoperability InteroperabilityIndex": "R98", "Interoperability InteroperabilityVersion": "[48, 49, 48, 48]", "EXIF InteroperabilityOffset": "960", "EXIF FileSource": "Digital Camera", "EXIF CustomRendered": "Normal", "EXIF ExposureMode": "Auto Exposure", "EXIF WhiteBalance": "Auto", "EXIF DigitalZoomRatio": "0", "EXIF SceneCaptureType": "Standard", "EXIF GainControl": "None"}