Talbot House
Wednesday 6th & Thursday 7th May 2026
For this tour, we have booked the whole of Talbot House exclusively for our overnight stay. Talbot House is a truly unique location in the bustling town of Poperinge, less than 10 miles from Ypres, where British troops were offered brief respite from the turmoil and brutality of the Great War. Safe from most German shelling, Poperinge became the nerve centre of the British sector and was where Army chaplains Neville Talbot and Philip “Tubby” Clayton opened a club which, for more than three years from December 1915 onwards, provided rest and recreation to all soldiers, genuinely regardless of their rank. The club was named after Neville’s brother Gilbert, killed nearby in 1915. Talbot House hasn’t changed from the Every Man’s Club it was a century ago; its legacy of social work in the community as Toc H endures.
The main house, still very much lived in and used till this day, exudes a relaxing club atmosphere. On arrival we shall have an introductory talk and guided visit through the house led by one of its own experts. After settling in, you may play the piano, have a chat with the wardens and staff, get some refreshments and then amble outside to enjoy the garden. Up the ladder to the top floor, you reach the heart of the club, its beautiful chapel. After breakfast next morning, we visit the museum in the old hop store adjacent to the house, which was converted into a concert hall during the War. A permanent exhibition immerses you in the history of the club over the last century.
The tour also includes a close look at a significant (though little known nowadays) battle fought by cavalry and infantry around Méteren in October 1914, battlefield sites relating to Talbot House and a resurrected trench system, and it concludes with a formal tribute at the grave of a Ticehurst man, Clarence Relf.
TOUR PROGRAMME
Day 1
Goudhurst: Pick-up by minibus
Folkestone – Calais: Channel crossing by Eurotunnel
Cassel: Hilltop home of the top brass; and a long history of war
Méteren: “The first formal British attack of the war”
Mont des Cats: Cavalry capture the monastery
Méteren: The making of ‘Monty’
Méteren: A rare private mausoleum; and a multi-national cemetery
Ouderdom: The most beautiful CWGC cemetery?
Poperinge: Check in at Talbot House; talk by in-house guide
Poperinge: Dinner at Hotel de la Paix (Or optional extra: by taxi to Ypres for the
Last Post ceremony at the Menin Gate)
Day 2
Poperinge: Breakfast in Talbot House
Poperinge: Talbot House Museum
Poperinge: ‘Shot at dawn’ memorial
Poperinge: Railway marshalling yards
Boezinge: Yorkshire Trench
Ypres: Lunch at Les Halles Restaurant in the town square
Sanctuary Wood Cemetery: Talbot House connection 1: Gilbert Talbot
Messines: Talbot House connection 2: The Pool of Peace (Spanbroekmolen Crater)
Ploegsteert (Underhill Farm Cemetery): Lay wreath for Gunner Clarence Relf of Ticehurst (208 Siege Battery, Royal Garrison Artillery; died 21st June 1917)
Calais – Folkestone: Channel crossing by Eurotunnel, and return home
Cost: £450 plus £50 single room supplement (includes guides, handbook, travel, hotel, dinner, breakfast and two lunches.
Subject to Change