Weblog’s a little late this week. I just got back from a trip to Flanders and the battlefields of the First World War, which, not entirely coincidentally, is both the time and the setting for the highly innovative and exceptionally well-received novella, “The Circling Song”. (Can’t remember who the author is but, well worth the read.) Anyway, as usual on these trips, I managed to pick up one or two little bits of information that are normally deemed too insignificant to be included in most history books. One in particular, struck me.
Far and away the most visible reminder of the carnage of that war are the cemeteries. Immediately following the war, it was decided that no fallen soldier was to be repatriated. Instead, France and Belgium granted pieces of land in perpetuity and the Commonwealth War Graves Commission set about the gargantuan task of finding and identifying as many of the fallen as possible. It was, of course, not always a straightforward business. Makeshift cemeteries would be shelled and shelled again, so that troops and bits of troops might be buried and re-buried several times in only a few months.
Nevertheless, many scores of thousands of men have identifiable graves and it was decided that families might wish to add – beyond the official name, regiment, rank and date of death – their own inscription. There was a snag, of course.
In the first place, there was a limit of 66 letters per man and, in the second, each of those letters would cost 7 pence – the equivalent of three-and-a-half new pence sterling. When one considers that the weekly wage of the average labourer in 1918 would have been around one pound ten shillings – approximately 150p – that charge amounts to quite a financial commitment.
Even the simplest inscription (“NOT FORGOTTEN” is common, as is “REST IN PEACE”) would have cost somewhere not unadjacent to a third of one week’s salary. To put it into perspective, the average weekly wage in the UK at present is around £450, with many earning far less. I don’t know many low-paid workers who could run to £150 for a two or three word inscription. Murdering darlings, indeed.
Naturally, officers tended to have wealthier families so they are the ones whose graves tend to have the more thoughtful, hence, longer inscriptions. And it’s interesting to note that wealth occasionally bought other privileges. I’ve recently heard of a grave bearing an inscription of over 160 letters, although this is very far from being the norm.
A number bear the Latin maxim, “IN DULCE ET DECORUM EST PRO PATRIA MORI” to demonstrate not only a knowledge of classical ideals but also the ability to stump up the equivalent of 450 quid for the privilege of doing so. Ironic, really in light of Wilfred Owen’s equally ironic use of the phrase in his poem of the same name, published after the war. (Incidentally, Canada and New Zealand refused to allow inscriptions in the interests of equality. The British, of course, had no such qualms)
Whilst I was there, last week, my wife texted me a few lines of A.E. Housman which (had I had the tragic necessity to require an epitaph for my own lost boy), I would have moved heaven and earth to have afforded.
Here dead lie we because we did not choose
to live and shame the land from which we sprung.
Life, to be sure, is nothing much to lose;
but young men think it is, and we were young.
Far and away the most visible reminder of the carnage of that war are the cemeteries. Immediately following the war, it was decided that no fallen soldier was to be repatriated. Instead, France and Belgium granted pieces of land in perpetuity and the Commonwealth War Graves Commission set about the gargantuan task of finding and identifying as many of the fallen as possible. It was, of course, not always a straightforward business. Makeshift cemeteries would be shelled and shelled again, so that troops and bits of troops might be buried and re-buried several times in only a few months.
Nevertheless, many scores of thousands of men have identifiable graves and it was decided that families might wish to add – beyond the official name, regiment, rank and date of death – their own inscription. There was a snag, of course.
In the first place, there was a limit of 66 letters per man and, in the second, each of those letters would cost 7 pence – the equivalent of three-and-a-half new pence sterling. When one considers that the weekly wage of the average labourer in 1918 would have been around one pound ten shillings – approximately 150p – that charge amounts to quite a financial commitment.
Even the simplest inscription (“NOT FORGOTTEN” is common, as is “REST IN PEACE”) would have cost somewhere not unadjacent to a third of one week’s salary. To put it into perspective, the average weekly wage in the UK at present is around £450, with many earning far less. I don’t know many low-paid workers who could run to £150 for a two or three word inscription. Murdering darlings, indeed.
Naturally, officers tended to have wealthier families so they are the ones whose graves tend to have the more thoughtful, hence, longer inscriptions. And it’s interesting to note that wealth occasionally bought other privileges. I’ve recently heard of a grave bearing an inscription of over 160 letters, although this is very far from being the norm.
A number bear the Latin maxim, “IN DULCE ET DECORUM EST PRO PATRIA MORI” to demonstrate not only a knowledge of classical ideals but also the ability to stump up the equivalent of 450 quid for the privilege of doing so. Ironic, really in light of Wilfred Owen’s equally ironic use of the phrase in his poem of the same name, published after the war. (Incidentally, Canada and New Zealand refused to allow inscriptions in the interests of equality. The British, of course, had no such qualms)
Whilst I was there, last week, my wife texted me a few lines of A.E. Housman which (had I had the tragic necessity to require an epitaph for my own lost boy), I would have moved heaven and earth to have afforded.
Here dead lie we because we did not choose
to live and shame the land from which we sprung.
Life, to be sure, is nothing much to lose;
but young men think it is, and we were young.
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