List of World War I Memorials and Cemeteries in Lorraine

Background
Lorraine comprises the "départements" of Meurthe-et-Moselle, Meuse, Moselle and Vosges and the principal cities are  Nancy,  Bar-le-Duc, Metz and Épinal.

Meurthe-et-Moselle
In Meurthe-et-Moselle we will identify memorials and cemeteries in Nancy, Badonviller, Pont-à-Mousson, Léomont, Rozelieures, Thiaucourt-Regniéville, Vitrimont, Sainte-Geneviève,  Gerbéviller, Pierre-Percée, Toul, Valleroy, Épinal, Champenoux and Metz.

Meuse
See List of World War 1 memorials and cemeteries in Verdun, List of World War I memorials and cemeteries in the Argonne and List of World War I memorials and cemeteries in the area of the St Mihiel salient.

Moselle
In Moselle we will identify memorials and cemeteries in Avricourt, Bidestroff, Dieuze, Lidrezing, Morhange, Riche, Sarrebourg, Sarreguemines and Vergaville.

Vosges
In Vosges we will identify memorials and cemeteries in Ban-de-Sapt, Bertrimoutier, Charmes, Lisseux, Mortagne, Rambervillers. Raon-l'Étape and Saint-Dié-des-Vosges.



Memorials linked to the fighting around Morhange in Moselle
The battlefield in fact lies north-east of Nancy, east of Pont-à-Mousson, and south-east of Metz. The area includes Freméry, Riche, Chicourt,Brehain, Conthil, Lidrezing, Cutting,Dieuze, Bidestroff and Vergaville.

Nancy
Nancy was never occupied by the German army in the 1914-1918 war but was in the sights of their artillery and was constantly shelled.

The Battle of the Haute Meurthe
After the defeats at the Battles of Lorraine and Sarrebourg, the 1st French Army retreated to the banks of the River Meurthe where they were involved in a series of encounters with the Germans in what is called the Battle of Haut-Meurthe which ran from 23 August to 10 September. There was fighting in front of Rambervillers on the Chipotte mountain and Saint-Barbe, at Saint-Dié, Mandray, the Anozel mountain and at Taintrux and Nompatelize.

These encounters were all of a defensive nature but after 11 September they became of an offensive nature with the 13th, 21st and 14th Army Corps and the "Vosges Army Group" playing important roles and in this area between Nancy and the Hautes Vosges the front line was defined and changed little until the end of the war in 1918 but saw fierce exchanges between the two sides trench to trench.

Senones
Senones lies north of Saint-Dié-des-Vosges and east of Raon-l'Étape.

There is a German War cemetery or Kriegsgräberstatte at Senones which contains 1.528 German burials. Of the 1.528 soldiers 784are buried in a grave, and 22 individual soldiers of them are unknown. The mass grave contains the remains of 744 killed soldiers, only 348 of them are known by their name. The "Schlacht in Lothringen" or the "Battle of Lorraine" from 25 to 28 August 1914, the defensive fighting in the winter 1914-1915, the trench warfare of 1915, and the war in late 1918 increased the number of dead in this sector of the front. Soldiers, buried here, came from garrisons in Bavaria, Baden, Hessen, Hanover, Brunswick, Ostfriesland, Wurttemberg, Westphalia, Thuringia, Brandenburg, Silesia and the Rhineland. On 25 August 1914, the Germans entered Senones on their march on St. Dié des Vosges and after the battle at la Chipotte and on 12 September 1914, units of the 30th Bavarian Reserve Division passing the defenceless town of Senones whilst retreating to return in the evening to occupy the town.

There is also a French War cemetery at Senones which contains the graves of 795 French Soldiers, including colonial soldiers. 372 Of these soldiers are buried in 2 ossuaries. There are also 6 Poles, 11 Roumanians and 6 Russians buried in the cemetery. Soldiers buried here were brought in from the battlefields in the area around Bois du Palon, Bois "Y", la Scierie de Malfosse, la Chapelle de la Halte, the nearby Mère Henry and the Haute-Forain.

Ban-de-Sapt
{| class="wikitable sortable" ! scope="col" style="width:1000px;"|The War Memorial at Ban-de-Sapt by Ėmile Just Bachelet
 * The 1914-1918 war memorial in this Vosges town stands in front of the town hall and a sculpture of a female figure representing the "Republic" is by Emile Just Bachelet. The words "Courage - Tenacité - Audace - Endurance" are inscribed on the memorial's base.
 * The 1914-1918 war memorial in this Vosges town stands in front of the town hall and a sculpture of a female figure representing the "Republic" is by Emile Just Bachelet. The words "Courage - Tenacité - Audace - Endurance" are inscribed on the memorial's base.

Some conclusions
The outcome of the battles in Lorraine and Alsace in 1914 effectively meant that the French plan XVII had failed and during the same period, and under tremendous pressure from the German armies advancing in the north, the French and British armies had begun the Great Retreat to the Marne River, pivoting on the fortress of Verdun. So serious did he perceive the situation that Sir John French favoured withdrawing the BEF to the coast of the English Channel from where it could be evacuated, as he judged the BEF to be vulnerable and exposed but the British Secretary of State for War, Lord Kitchener, who ironically had never been in favour of the BEF's role alongside the French army, now insisted they stay side side with the French.

The German Von Schlieffen Plan was now starting to show cracks and Moltke was too prone to wavering and lacked the firm hand that was required. The German right wing had been weakened by the need to shift men and resources to bolster the offensive in East Prussia and to hold ground in Lorraine and Von Kluck's decision to take his First Army east of the French capital rather than keeping to the west of Paris, as Von Schlieffen had insisted should happen, had exposed his right flank which the Allies exploited in the First Battle of the Marne in early September, enabling the German advance to be halted.

The French no longer saw themselves achieving a swift, decisive victory and their priority now was to avoid defeat. Joffre, blamed the failure of Plan XVII squarely on the shoulders of his subordinates, claiming defeat stemmed from "grave shortcomings on the part of commanders." and many were sacked and even Lanrezac failed to escape Joffre's axe and was retired despite his decision to retreat after Charleroi being seen by so many students of the war as being the wisest course.