Battle of Arras (1917) 1917
Recorded location from Wikidata; battle sites are often approximate.
Key facts
| Date | 9 April 1917 – 16 May 1917 | Wikidata |
|---|---|---|
| Year | 1917 | Wikidata P580 (start time) |
| Era | World War I era (1914–1918) | derived from year |
| Location | France | Natural Earth (modern borders) |
| Continent | Europe | Natural Earth |
| War / conflict | Western Front | Wikidata P361 |
| Participants | British Empire, German Empire, United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland | Wikidata P710 |
| Coordinates | 50.2897, 2.7808 | Wikidata P625 |
About the battle
The Battle of Arras, also known as the Second Battle of Arras, was a British offensive on the Western Front during the First World War. From 9 April to 16 May 1917, British troops attacked German defences near the French city of Arras on the Western Front. The British achieved the longest advance since trench warfare had begun, surpassing the record set by the French Sixth Army on 1 July 1916 in the First day on the Somme. The British advance slowed in the next few days and the German defence recovered. The battle became a costly stalemate for both sides and by the end of the battle, the British Third Army and the First Army had suffered about 160,000 casualties and the German 6th Army about 125,000.
For much of the war, the opposing armies on the Western Front were at a stalemate, with a continuous line of trenches from the Belgian coast to the Swiss border. The Allied objective from early 1915 was to break through the German defences into the open ground beyond and engage the numerically inferior German Army (Westheer) in a war of movement. The British attack at Arras was part of the Anglo-French Nivelle Offensive, the main part of which was the Second Battle of the Aisne 50 mi (80 km) to the south.
Text adapted from the Wikipedia article Battle of Arras (1917) (revision 1375347705), licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. Changes: excerpted from the article lead section; shortened by selecting paragraphs and trimming at a sentence boundary; formatting and citations removed. No text added.
Nearby battles
- Battle of Arras (1654) 1654 · 0 km
- Battle of Arras (1914) 1914 · 0 km
- Siege of Arras (1640) 1640 · 0 km
- Siege of Arras (1414) 1414 · 0 km
- Battle of Arras (1940) 1940 · 7 km
- Battle of the Scarpe 1918 · 8 km
Other battles of the Western Front
- Battle of Mont Sorrel 1916
- Battle of Thiepval Ridge 1916
- Battle of Verdun 1916
- Battle of the Somme 1916
- Hohenzollern Redoubt action, 2–18 March 1916 1916
- Battle of Cambrai (1917) 1917
- Battle of Messines (1917) 1917
- Battle of Passchendaele 1917
- Battle of the Hills 1917
- Second Battle of the Aisne 1917
All 48 battles of the Western Front →
Browse more: battles in France · Europe · World War I era battles