THE CEMETERIES.
WITH the growth of the war the Commission’s work naturally covered every part of the world where the men of the Empire had served and died—from the vast and known cities of our dead in Flanders and France to hidden and outlying burial-grounds of a few score at the ends of the earth. These resting-places are situated on every conceivable site—on bare hills flayed by years of battle, in orchards and meadows, beside populous towns or little villages, in jungle-glades, at coast ports, in far-away islands, among desert sands, and desolate ravines. It would be as impossible as undesirable to reduce them all to any uniformity of aspect by planting or by architecture.
In a war where the full strength of nations was used without respect of persons, no difference could be made between the graves of officers or men. Yet some sort of central idea was needed that should symbolise our common sacrifice wherever our dead might be laid; and it was realised, above all, that each cemetery and individual grave should be made as permanent as man’s art could devise.
Their Design and Care.
THE Commission instructed Sir Frederic Kenyon, K.C.B., to report how these aims could best be realised, and he, after consulting very fully with the relatives, representatives of the Services, religion and art, and knowing the practical limitations, particularly in obtaining labour, for carrying out such a vast undertaking, recommended that in each cemetery there should stand a Cross of Sacrifice, and an altarlike Stone of Remembrance, and that the headstones of the graves should be of uniform shape and size. Stone crosses to succeed the temporary wooden crosses were at first suggested, but crosses of the small size necessitated by the nearness of the graves to each other do not allow sufficient space for the men’s names and the inscriptions, and are also by their shape too fragile and too subject to the action of frost and weather for enduring use. Plain headstones, measuring 2 ft. 6 in. by 1 ft. 3 in., were therefore chosen, upon which the Cross or other religious symbol of the dead man’s faith could be carved and his Regimental badge fully displayed. The Regiments have been consulted as to the designs of these badges, some of which have now been approved and are ready for engraving as soon as experiments which are being carried on have shown how to overcome the difficulties of dealing with such numbers. In due time, then, wherever a man may be buried, from East Africa to North Russia, his headstone will carry his Regimental badge, identifiable the world over.
Besides the fighting forces, provision must be made for the graves of the merchant-seamen and discharged men whose deaths were due to enemy action, for Sisters and Nurses killed or died of wounds or disease, for Labour units of all races, and, indeed, for all who have served in any capacity in the war. The distinctive badges of these headstones are not yet all decided upon.
