At the Battle of Keren, 3,000 Allied soldiers died taking a position held by 23,000 Italian and colonial troops across mountain terrain cut by a single railway. The battle lasted 53 days — from February to March 1941 — before British and Commonwealth forces finally broke through. The Italian commander eventually blew the railway pass with explosives to deny it to the advancing British, but it was too late. Keren fell on 27 March 1941. The victory opened the road to Asmara and effectively decided the East African campaign.
The Commonwealth War Graves cemeteries that mark the battle sit quietly on the edge of town. They are well-maintained in the understated way that Commonwealth cemeteries tend to be, and worth visiting even if you have no particular connection to the history. The scale of the losses — British, Indian, Free French, Sudanese soldiers all buried here — makes the quiet rather pointed. There is also an Italian cemetery nearby. Together they give a more complete picture of a battle that is barely remembered outside military history circles but was, in its time, one of the most fiercely contested engagements of the entire war.