The Long Road Home: Britain, Germany and the Repatriation of Indian Prisoners of War after the First World War

Desperate for bodies to halt the rapidly advancing German Army at the start of the First World War, the British Empire deployed Indian and British soldiers belonging to the Lahore and Meerut Divisions to France and the trenches outside Ypres in October 1914. Between October 1914 and December 1915, some 89,335 Indian sepoys-as Indian rifl emen were known-supplemented by 49,273 Indian labourers served on the Western Front, fi ghting at Ypres, Festubert, Givenchy, Neuve Chapelle, Second Ypres and Loos, suffering some 34,252 casualties. 1 In December 1915, British commanders permanently withdrew all of the Indian infantry from Western Europe and redeployed the men to fronts in the Middle East.