The ditches paralleling the road were choked with felled trees, and, what with the naked limbs, were as spiky as shad spines.

Of the small cottages which once had stood in the vicinity of the fort not one remained standing.

Their sites were marked by flattened heaps of brick and plaster from which charred ends of rafters protruded.

It was as though a giant had sat himself down upon each little house in turn and squashed it to the foundation stones.
As a fort Des Sarts dated back to 1883.

I speak of it in the past tense, because the Germans had put it in that tense.