Zimmermann and WWI-heritage in Antwerp (2009-2012)
46 aerial photographs dating from January 1918 documented the German defences along the Belgian-Dutch border and around Antwerp, of which part is now opened to the public
From research to valorisation
Keen to have them analyzed to extract that information, in 2008 Antwerp provincial authorities launched a project entitled ‘Inventorization and processing of the Zimmermann aerial photograph collection’.
The research showed that the series of photographs depicts a part of the German defences along the Belgian-Dutch border. Fearing an attack from the neutral Netherlands during the First World War, the German occupier built a defence line of bunkers and trenches along large parts of the border. More than 530 military defence elements were identified and located on a modern-day map. The defence elements varied greatly from trenches and breastworks, through bunkers and artillery posts to the forts and sconces of Antwerp’s outer line.
How much of that military infrastructure from the First World War has survived? That was the question behind the project ‘Zimmermann anno 2010. Inventorization and (environmental) analysis of aboveground WW1 relics from the Antwerpen-Turnhoutstellung’.
In 2012 the European project ‘Great War between the lines’, part of the European ‘Interreg IV A–2 Seas programme’, provided the opportunity to carry out follow-up research. The project ‘The possibility of providing access to the Antwerpen-Turnhoutstellung military heritage’ required the presentation of proposals for preserving and accessing the heritage for three specifically chosen areas of the line. After the research, one of these initiative was executed: the WWI trenches in the Mastenbos (Kapellen) are opened to the public and attracted over 20.000 visitors in the first year after the inauguration in November 2014.
Results
To bring the results to a larger public, the Heritage Department of the Province of Antwerp published the output of the project, including all original photographs, overview maps and historical background, as a two-volumes hard-cover book: "Vergeten Linies. Antwerpse bunkers en loopgraven door de lens van Leutnant Zimmermann (1918)".