Indian Army War Cemetery Forli

On 3 September 1943 the Allies invaded the Italian mainland, the invasion coinciding with an armistice made with the Italians who then re-entered the war on the Allied side. Following the fall of Rome to the Allies in June 1944, the German retreat became ordered and successive stands were made on a series of defensive lines. In the northern Appenine mountains the last of these, the Gothic Line, was breached by the Allies during the Autumn campaign and the front inched forward as far as Ravenna in the Adratic sector, but with divisions transferred to support the new offensive in France and the Germans dug in to a number of key defensive positions, the advance stalled as winter set in.

The site of this cemetery was selected in December 1944 by the 10th Indian Division, which had come into the line in the Adriatic sector south of Cesena at the beginning of October 1944. The division had played an important part in the heavy fighting, in appalling weather, between then and the end of the year, suffering considerable casualties. It had been preceded on the Eighth Army front by the 4th Indian Division, which had left to go to Greece and during the fighting in the spring of 1945, the 8th Indian Division also fought on this front.

Indian Army War Cemetery contains 496 Commonwealth burials of the Second World War.

Within the cemetery, is the Forli Cremation Memorial commemorating nearly 800 Hindu and Sikh officers and men of the Indian Army. This is one of three Indian cremation memorials in Italy, the others being in Sangro River War Cemetery and in Rimini Gurkha War Cemetery.

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Source

• Text: Commonwealth War Graves Commission
• Photos: Commonwealth War Graves Commission