"South Africans loot Canadian soldiers' graves"

[Broznitsky]

APR 07, 2004 NATIONAL POST PAGE: A5 (CANADA)

South Africans loot Canadian soldiers' graves

Boer War fallen: Stones, metal plaques stolen for building materials

Chris Wattie, National Post

The graves of more than 100 Canadian soldiers killed during the Boer War have been damaged and robbed, and Veterans Affairs Canada said yesterday the Canadian embassy in South Africa will be asked to investigate the extent of the damage.

Veterans Affairs admitted yesterday it has no idea of the state of its war graves in South Africa and spokesman Philip Michael said he was shocked by pictures obtained by the National Post showing extensive damage to graves of some of the more than 300 Canadian soldiers who died in the 1899-1902 war.

"This is totally unacceptable -- it's got to be fixed," he said from Charlottetown. "If this is representative of all the Canadian war graves there, then we've got a major problem on our hands."

Mr. Michael said this was the first indication he had that there was something seriously amiss with the Canadian Boer War graves. "It's very shocking and completely unacceptable, obviously."

He said the department would contact the agency it contracts to maintain the graves and will ask Canadian embassy officials to look into the situation. "We're going to discuss this with our South African partners immediately," he said. "And we'll be communicating with our embassy first thing [today]."

However, a Boer War researcher and former battlefield tour guide in South Africa said the Canadian government was told last year about the state of its Boer War graves.

"The graves that were in immaculate condition in 2000, when I went back in 2002 and 2003, they had actually disintegrated into a disaster," said Dave Gyles, a Canadian now working for Australia's veterans affairs ministry.

"I've had many discussions with them [Veterans Affairs Canada]. In fact, I went to Charlottetown just this past summer to speak to them. I warned them last year that something should be done.

"These graves are under threat," he said. "They just told me, 'Don't worry about it'.... They just basically ignored me."

Mr. Gyles, who has located and photographed all 302 of the graves of Canadians killed in South Africa, said the graves are scattered across the country in more than 50 cemeteries. They have been pillaged by locals looking for scrap metal or stones for building material, he said.

"They've taken all of those brass plates off and actually pushed over quite a few of the headstones ... to turn them into floors for some of the huts in the townships. Others have been just smashed," he said.

"I actually came across one guy while he was actually doing it.... I went to the police just down the road and they told me they're short of resources and they don't have time to worry about people that've been dead for 100 years."

The Canadian graves include members of the RCMP -- then known as the Northwest Mounted Police -- who served in the South African Constabulary during the bloody guerrilla war with the Boers.

"They got headstones made out of steel ... weighing about three or four kilos. Someone's come into the cemeteries with acetylene torches and just cut down hundreds of them, not just Canadians but everybody, for the scrap metal," Mr. Gyles said. "All they leave is this stump barely above the ground."

Mr. Gyles, who has also photographed hundreds of British, New Zealand and Australian grave sites in South Africa, fears the damage will be irreversible within two years. "There's no maintenance that's been done to these graves since 1904," he said.

"There's virtually nothing left of some cemeteries."

South African witch doctors looking for human bones to use in their magic rituals and grave robbers looking for buried valuables have reportedly desecrated some Boer War graves, but Mr. Gyles said he does not believe any of the Canadian graves have been dug up.

Mr. Michael said Veterans Affairs is determined to do what it can to maintain the graves. "The government of Canada wants these graves taken care of," he said. "And we're willing to do our utmost to see that done."

Canada pays about $3,000 a year to the South African Heritage Resource Agency to maintain the graves, or about $10 a year for each grave.

South African officials have for years requested more financial help from the Canadian government and in 1996, the Royal Canadian Legion asked Canada's Department of Veterans Affairs to take some responsibility for the Boer War graves, but to no avail.

The British government is negotiating a four-year contract to maintain the South African war graves with the Commonwealth War Graves Commission. Canada will be included in that deal, Mr. Michael said.

This will be the first time the commission -- a multinational body set up to maintain the graves of those who died in two world wars -- will take responsibility for the fallen from a conflict that pre-dates the First World War. There are more than 25,000 British war graves in South Africa.

The Boer War marked Canada's first deployment of troops overseas, a small contingent that included some of the country's oldest regiments, including the Royal Canadian Regiment and the Lord Strathcona's Horse (Royal Canadians).

[Terry Denham]

This will be the first time the commission -- a multinational body set up to maintain the graves of those who died in two world wars -- will take responsibility for the fallen from a conflict that pre-dates the First World War.

This statement is not accurate. CWGC look after graves back into the nineteenth century on an agency basis for the UK MoD - back to the Crimean War.

However, that does not detract from the importance or urgency of the situation in South Africa which appears to be dire!