The Empire's Greatest War Memorial.
Honouring the "Missing" at Menin Gate, Ypres.
The Ypres Times.
Specially contributed to The Ypres Times by HENRY BENSON.
Whilst it is painful to reflect that 423,000 of the 1,019,882 men of the Empire who
fell in the Great War have no known graves and come under the official category of the
missing," it will be a consolation to bereaved relatives to know that their names ate to
be honoured permanently in stone in the areas where they made the supreme sacrifice.
The exact form that a tribute, worthy of their immortal heroism, should take caused
the Imperial War Graves Commission much anxiety and deliberation. Originally, it
was suggested that individual headstones bearing their names should be set up in certain
British cemeteries adjacent to where they fell, but the idea was eventually rejected on
the ground that, as time went on, a false impression might be created that their remains
lay buried beneath the stones. Consequently, it was decided to erect collective memorials,
dignified and expressive of a mighty Empire's gratitude, in the various war zones where
they met their deaths.
An Impressive Monument.
I have recently returned from an inspection of the most impressive, as it is also the
largest, of these monuments. I refer to the one now nearing completion at the immortal
Menin Gate, Ypres. As many members of the League are aware, this stately structure,
from the design of Sir Reginald Blomfield, R.A., is being set up at the city boundary on
the main road to Menin, along which there passed, never to return, the heroes who are
commemorated there. It takes the form of an arch or gateway, the outstanding feature
being a main hall about 70 feet span by 50 feet in height, and 130 feet in length from
end to end. The materials used are Euville Marbier stonea cross between Bath and
Portland stone in appearancewith a sparing use of small Belgian red bricks whilst
reinforced concrete has been employed in the foundations and the vault.
Looking at the arch from outside the old ramparts, the main building rises in three
great steps, and is surmounted by the figure of a recumbent lion. Beneath the lion, and
just above the soffit of the arch, is the inscription To the Armies of the British
Empire who stood here from 1914 to 1918, and to those of their Dead who have 110 known
grave." In the same position at the city end of the arch is the inscription Ad
majorem Dei gloriam. Here are recorded names of officers and men who fell in Ypres
Salient, but to whom the fortune of war denied the known and honoured burial given to
their comrades in Death."
Vauban's Impregnable Fortifications.
To soldiers who fought in the Ypres Salient it will be of interest to hear that in the
course of his experiments Sir Reginald Blomfield came across an extremely curious point
of construction, near to the gate, in the breaches of the old rampart made by the German
shells. The brick-work, which is of great thickness (18 feet in places), was constructed
with an outer skin, not bonded into it at the back, as is customary, but secured to it
by long slabs 6" X 6" in sections of hard blue Belgian stone at regular intervals. The
effect was that with the gun pow-er available in Yauban's time only the outer skin was
destroyed by artillery, and this it was possible to repair quickly and readily. Even in
the late War, despite the enormous gashes in the wall face made by modern shells, these old
ramparts successfully withstood the German fire. This is the more remarkable in view
of the fact that these fortifications were built in the seventeenth century but then
