Le Trou Aid Post Cemetery

{{short description|Cemetery located in Pas-de-Calais, in France}}

{{Use dmy dates|date=April 2022}}

{{Infobox military memorial

| name =Le Trou Aid Post Cemetery

| body =Commonwealth War Graves Commission

| image =240px

| caption =Le Trou Aid Post

| commemorates =Allied war dead of World War I

| use_dates =

| coordinates={{Coord|50|37|26|N|02|49|35|E|region:FR_type:landmark|name=Le Trou Aid Post Cemetery|display=inline,title}}

| location =

| nearest_town =Fleurbaix

| designer =Sir Herbert Baker

| inscription =

| established = October 1914

| unveiled =

| total =350+

| unknowns = 200+

| commemorated =

| by_country ={{plainlist|

• United Kingdom
• British Commonwealth
• France}}

| by_war =

| source =Commonwealth War Graves Commission

}}

The Le Trou Aid Post Cemetery is a World War I cemetery located in the commune of Fleurbaix, in the Pas-de-Calais departement of France, about {{convert|3|km|mi}} south of the village of Fleurbaix on the D175 road (rue de Pétillon).{{Cite web |title=Le Trou Aid Post Cemetery, Fleurbaix |url = http://www.cwgc.org/find-a-cemetery/cemetery/31100 |publisher=Commonwealth War Graves Commission |work=Cwgc.org |accessdate=29 December 2013 }}.

British soldiers of the 19th Infantry Brigade made the earliest burials at the site in October 1914 during the First Battle of Ypres.{{Cite web |url=http://www.cwgc.org/find-a-cemetery/cemetery/31100/LE%20TROU%20AID%20POST%20CEMETERY,%20FLEURBAIX|title=CWGC – Cemetery Details |publisher=Commonwealth War Graves Commission |work=Cwgc.org |accessdate=29 December 2013 }} By the end of the war, the cemetery contained 123 graves. This number nearly tripled after a postwar consolidation of war burial sites, when Le Trou Aid Post was expanded by the architect Sir Herbert Baker.

Described as one of Baker's most sentimental works,{{Cite book |title=Cemeteries of the Great War by Sir Edwin Lutyens |last=Geurst |first=Jeroen |year=2010 |publisher=010 Publ. |location=Rotterdam |isbn=9789064507151 |page=70 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=UnZfMbYczpUC&pg=PA70 }} the rural site is surrounded by a narrow moat and sheltered by a grove of weeping willows. Visitors approach over a footbridge and enter through a delicate cottage-style gateway.

The cemetery contains more than 350 graves, and over two hundred are unidentified. The dead represent the battlefields of Ypres, Le Maisnil (October 1914), Aubers Ridge (May 1915), Loos (September–October 1915), and Fromelles (July 1916).