Ceremonies and Sites of Memory
The Unknown Soldier
One unknown to honour all the fallen: five nations, one shared tribute
France
Arc de Triomphe, Paris · 11 November 1920
Wishing to honour the 1,400,000 dead of the Great War of 1914-1918, the French government decided to inter an unknown soldier beneath the Arc de Triomphe in Paris. To this end, nine remains of unknown soldiers who had fallen during the principal battles were exhumed: Verdun, the Somme, Chemin des Dames, Flanders, Artois, the Marne, Lorraine, Alsace and Champagne. Lacking certainty about the nationality of one of the bodies, only eight coffins were placed in a column within the citadel of Verdun on 9 November 1920, watched over by a guard of honour drawn from the 132nd Infantry Regiment.
Auguste Thin's choice
On 10 November, André Maginot, Minister of Pensions, asked Auguste Thin, a guard of honour and son of a soldier who had disappeared in the war, to designate the soldier who would rest beneath the Arc de Triomphe. Unsure how to choose among the eight coffins before him, he added up the digits of his regiment number, the 132nd: the sum was 6, belonging to the 6th Corps, so he chose the sixth coffin, laying upon it a bouquet of red and white carnations.
The designated soldier immediately left the citadel of Verdun under military escort, transferred by train to Paris. The coffin first stopped at the Panthéon, where a first tribute was paid by President Alexandre Millerand, before being kept vigil through the night at the Place Denfert-Rochereau.
On 11 November 1920, the coffin, placed on the limber of a 155mm field gun, made its solemn entrance beneath the Arc de Triomphe after travelling the full length of the Champs-Élysées. That same day, the seven unselected unknown soldiers were buried in the "Square of the Seven Unknowns" at the Faubourg-Pavé cemetery near Verdun. On 28 January 1921, the Unknown Soldier was interred in the presence of civil and military authorities and Marshals Joffre, Foch and Pétain.
The tomb and the Eternal Flame
The tomb consists of a vault covered by a Vire granite slab bearing the inscription: "Here lies a French soldier who died for the Fatherland, 1914-1918". An eternal flame, lit for the first time on 11 November 1923, rises from the muzzle of a cannon aimed skyward, set into an inverted shield whose chiselled surface is formed by swords arranged as a star.
Since that date, the flame has been rekindled every evening at 6:30pm. This "rekindling ceremony" is carried out by the association La Flamme sous l'Arc de Triomphe, Flamme de la Nation.
Great Britain
Westminster Abbey, London · 11 November 1920
In 1920, David Railton, a British Army chaplain on the Western Front, proposed to the Dean of Westminster a deeply symbolic idea: to bury an unidentified British soldier, fallen on the French battlefields, in Westminster Abbey, the church of kings. This soldier would become the representative of the hundreds of thousands of dead of the British Empire.
Four unidentified soldiers' remains were exhumed and transported to the chapel of Saint-Pol-sur-Ternoise, near Arras. A brigadier, blindfolded, stepped forward and placed his hand on one of the four coffins draped in the British flag. The choice was made.
The remains were placed in an oak coffin from Hampton Court Palace, bound with iron and adorned with a medieval sword chosen personally by King George V from the Royal Collection, beneath the inscription: "A British warrior who fell during the Great War 1914-1918 for King and Country".
After a salute from Marshal Foch at Boulogne, HMS Verdun, escorted by six warships, crossed the Channel. On 11 November 1920, the cortège moved through a London packed with a dense and silent crowd. King George V unveiled the Cenotaph at Whitehall, designed by Edwin Lutyens, then followed the procession to the Abbey, surrounded by his sons and ministers of State.
Among the guests of honour: one hundred women who had each lost their husband or their son during the conflict. The remains were interred in soil drawn from each of the principal battlefields, then sealed beneath a slab of black Belgian marble. It is the only tomb in the Abbey on which it is strictly forbidden to walk.
The United States
Arlington National Cemetery · 11 November 1921
The idea of honouring an unidentified American soldier who had died on French soil came from William Connor, commander of American forces in France, inspired by the French initiative. On 4 March 1921, under President Warren G. Harding, Congress approved the creation of a tomb at Arlington National Cemetery.
On 24 October 1921, at Châlons-sur-Marne, Sergeant Edward Younger selected the American Unknown Soldier from among four sets of remains by placing a white rose on one of the coffins.
On 25 October, the remains were transported to Le Havre by special train, where Franco-American patriotic ceremonies accompanied their embarkation. Having received the Légion d'Honneur from the hands of Minister André Maginot, the Unknown Soldier embarked aboard the cruiser USS Olympia for the United States. On 11 November 1921, the remains were interred at Arlington in a ceremony presided over by President Harding.
Over the years, the tomb was extended to include unidentified soldiers from the Second World War, the Korean War and initially the Vietnam War (the Vietnam soldier having been identified and exhumed in 1998). The perpetual guard, maintained by the 3rd Infantry Regiment, "The Old Guard", bears witness to the enduring importance of this tradition.
Canada
National War Memorial, Ottawa · 28 May 2000
In 1998, the Royal Canadian Legion launched the project of incorporating a Tomb of the Unknown Soldier into Canada's National War Memorial, to honour the thousands of Canadian military personnel and Merchant Navy members whose burial places remain unknown.
Given the historical significance of the Battle of Vimy Ridge — the first major engagement of the Canadian Forces under Canadian command — it was decided that the Unknown Soldier's remains would come from this emblematic site.
On 25 May 2000, the remains were laid before the Cross of Sacrifice at Canadian Cemetery No. 2 at Vimy, then honoured at the Vimy Memorial in the presence of French and Canadian dignitaries, before their return to Canada aboard a CC-150 aircraft of the Canadian Armed Forces.
Following a period of public vigil at the Peace Tower, on 28 May 2000, a national ceremony drew more than 15,000 spectators and approximately 1,000 veterans to the National War Memorial, where the tomb was sealed.
Today, during the national Remembrance Day ceremony, thousands of Canadians lay their poppies on the tomb in tribute to those who gave their lives for their country.
Australia
Australian War Memorial, Canberra · 11 November 1993
More than 310,000 Australian soldiers took part in the First World War, 180,000 of them on the Western Front. Among them, 60,000 lost their lives — 48,000 on the Western Front, where some 11,000 graves of unknown soldiers are found.
To mark the 75th anniversary of the end of the Great War, the remains of an unknown Australian soldier were exhumed on 2 November 1993 from Adelaide Cemetery at Villers-Bretonneux, built in June 1918 by the 2nd and 3rd Australian Divisions. Following a ceremony at the Australian memorial at Villers-Bretonneux and a stop at the Menin Gate at Ypres, the remains flew from Cambrai to Sydney, then were kept in vigil for three days at Old Parliament House in Canberra.
On 11 November 1993, the soldier was interred beneath the dome of the Hall of Memory at the Australian War Memorial, just after 11 o'clock.
During the burial ceremony, Robert Comb, a veteran of the Western Front, placed on the coffin a handful of French earth from the site of the Pozières windmill, where 7,000 Australian soldiers lost their lives in six weeks. As he let the soil fall into the grave, he whispered:
"There you go, son. You're home."