Danger Tree, Memorial landmark at Beaumont-Hamel, France

The Danger Tree stands within a large battlefield park that preserves the landscape where soldiers fought during World War I. The site contains original trenches, burial grounds, and numerous memorials that help visitors understand the scale and nature of the conflict that took place here.

On 1 July 1916, 800 soldiers of the Royal Newfoundland Regiment left their trenches at Beaumont-Hamel. The Danger Tree was ordered as a rendezvous point in no man's land, but the Germans could see it easily and fired on the men who reached it. The next day only 68 answered roll call: 255 dead, 386 wounded, 91 missing.

The name comes from the tree's role as a designated rallying point in no man's land, where the Newfoundlanders were to receive their new action plan. German observers could see the tree easily and shelled it, killing soldiers who had reached it; a rumour holds that nobody passed it alive in the first days of the Somme campaign. Today a group of small trees grows beside the bare trunk, thought to spring from the same root system as the original.

The site is open to visitors who can walk the grounds at their own pace, with interpretation signs helping explain the landscape and key locations. A visitor center provides additional context and background information to help understand what you are seeing across the battlefield.

The bare trunk is not a replica: it is the original tree, killed by shellfire but left standing. Beside it grow small trees believed to share the original's root system. The tree stood in no man's land, visible to German gunners, yet was ordered as the Newfoundlanders' rallying point.