Illegal exhumations from Belgium and France in the 1930's

[Gunner 87]

Hi Guys.

I am a member of a WW1 German History Facebook group. Today a post caught my eye that I thought may interest some of our members.

The attached two newspaper articles date from the 1930's when it was alleged British soldiers were being exhumed on request of those who could afford it and returned to the UK. Though a denial from the IWGC was issued the report written by the source states that an investigation was conducted the details of which are still held by the CWGC. It appears there were a number of unsuccessful attempts at removing British dead but certainly German soldiers had been exhumed. A named suspect was investigated but when police went to interview him he could not be traced.

Maybe some members are aware of these allegations.

Regards Gunner 87

Edited 25 June , 2022 by Gunner 87

[Michelle Young]

I read an account on the CWGC site of a family who exhumed their son from Loos British Cemetery and got him back to Canada in a suitcase. @J Banning put me onto it.

[ilkley remembers]

Think an illegal exhumation is mentioned in ‘The Searchers’ by Robert Sackville-West when a body was exhumed from Tyne Cot in 1921 and later discovered in a suitcase  at Antwerp.

 

Probably wasn’t too difficult to find somebody to open a grave in France as it was an ‘accepted practice for relatives to claim the body of a fallen relative for re-burial near to their home

[Gunner 87]

9 minutes ago, ilkley remembers said:

Think an illegal exhumation is mentioned in ‘The Searchers’ by Robert Sackville-West when a body was exhumed from Tyne Cot in 1921 and later discovered in a suitcase  at Antwerp.

 

Probably wasn’t too difficult to find somebody to open a grave in France as it was an ‘accepted practice for relatives to claim the body of a fallen relative for re-burial near to their home

 yes, just read the Tyne Cot soldier was Grenville Hopkins .. and he was actually one of a number .. 

Edited 25 June , 2022 by Gunner 87

[helpjpl]

William Arthur Peel Durie:

1)  Findagrave

https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/12282038/william-arthur_peel-durie

2)  Dictionary of Canadian Biography:

Durie's mother .... petitioned Canadian officials, including the current minister for the militia, Hugh Guthrie, for permission to return the remains to Canada at her own expense, and even ambushed Prime Minister Arthur Meighen when he visited the King Edward Hotel in Toronto. It was all to no avail. So in June 1921 Anna and Helen went to France. Despite attempts by local IWGC officials to restrain this “quite unreasonable” woman who “has practically lost her senses on this one subject,” Anna and her daughter, aided by two local men, exhumed Arthur’s blanket-wrapped corpse from Corkscrew British Cemetery, near Loos-en-Gohelle, on the night of 30 July. However, when the body, now placed in a zinc-lined coffin, was hoisted onto a waiting cart, the horse shied and snapped the shafts, the broken wood piercing the animal’s side. The remains in the new casket were returned to the grave.

Four years later the two women tried again. In February 1925 Anna learned that those interred at Corkscrew had been moved to the Loos British Cemetery nearby, seemingly confirming her worst fears that her son would lie in an unmarked site. Late on 25 July hired men forced open one end of the coffin and dragged out what survived of Arthur’s corpse, leaving behind fragments of bone and clothing. The body was then smuggled back across the Atlantic as luggage. For three days it lay “in state” in the front room of the St George Street house, before being buried on 22 August in the family plot in St James’ Cemetery.

France was eager to prosecute, but British and Canadian authorities were fearful of rousing dormant resentment among the general populace. An internal IWGC report noted that “it is the view of those familiar with the case that any reopening by legal process will result in more harm than good.” The Duries’ was not the only attempt that had been made by a Canadian family to repatriate a loved one’s remains. In 1919, with the consent of the prefect of Pas-de-Calais, France, the body of Major Charles Elliott Sutcliffe was moved from its resting place at Épinoy to a private vault close by, and it was eventually reburied in Lindsay, Ont. And in May 1921, after being refused permission by the IWGC, the father of Private Grenville Carson Hopkins took his son’s corpse from a cemetery in Belgium to a mortuary in nearby Antwerp, but it was recovered before it could be shipped to Canada, and those involved were brought to trial.

http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/peel_anna_bella_16E.html

Edit

3.  CWGC file:

http://archive.cwgc.org/Record.aspx?src=CalmView.Catalog&id=CWGC%2F8%2F1%2F4%2F1%2F2%2F61&pos=1

JP

Edited 25 June , 2022 by helpjpl

[aconnolly]

Sir Fabian Ware's comments from NZ newspaper The Star, 13 December 1934:

[Gunner 87]

5 minutes ago, helpjpl said:

William Arthur Peel Durie:

1)  Findagrave

https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/12282038/william-arthur_peel-durie

2)  Dictionary of Canadian Biography:

Durie's mother .... petitioned Canadian officials, including the current minister for the militia, Hugh Guthrie, for permission to return the remains to Canada at her own expense, and even ambushed Prime Minister Arthur Meighen when he visited the King Edward Hotel in Toronto. It was all to no avail. So in June 1921 Anna and Helen went to France. Despite attempts by local IWGC officials to restrain this “quite unreasonable” woman who “has practically lost her senses on this one subject,” Anna and her daughter, aided by two local men, exhumed Arthur’s blanket-wrapped corpse from Corkscrew British Cemetery, near Loos-en-Gohelle, on the night of 30 July. However, when the body, now placed in a zinc-lined coffin, was hoisted onto a waiting cart, the horse shied and snapped the shafts, the broken wood piercing the animal’s side. The remains in the new casket were returned to the grave.

Four years later the two women tried again. In February 1925 Anna learned that those interred at Corkscrew had been moved to the Loos British Cemetery nearby, seemingly confirming her worst fears that her son would lie in an unmarked site. Late on 25 July hired men forced open one end of the coffin and dragged out what survived of Arthur’s corpse, leaving behind fragments of bone and clothing. The body was then smuggled back across the Atlantic as luggage. For three days it lay “in state” in the front room of the St George Street house, before being buried on 22 August in the family plot in St James’ Cemetery.

France was eager to prosecute, but British and Canadian authorities were fearful of rousing dormant resentment among the general populace. An internal IWGC report noted that “it is the view of those familiar with the case that any reopening by legal process will result in more harm than good.” The Duries’ was not the only attempt that had been made by a Canadian family to repatriate a loved one’s remains. In 1919, with the consent of the prefect of Pas-de-Calais, France, the body of Major Charles Elliott Sutcliffe was moved from its resting place at Épinoy to a private vault close by, and it was eventually reburied in Lindsay, Ont. And in May 1921, after being refused permission by the IWGC, the father of Private Grenville Carson Hopkins took his son’s corpse from a cemetery in Belgium to a mortuary in nearby Antwerp, but it was recovered before it could be shipped to Canada, and those involved were brought to trial.

http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/peel_anna_bella_16E.html

JP

Thank you JP, I appreciate you taking the time to write that out. It must have been awful for the parents to have to resort to those tactics just to repatriate their sons. 

[Gunner 87]

9 minutes ago, aconnolly said:

Sir Fabian Ware's comments from NZ newspaper The Star, 13 December 1934:

Thank you aconnolly, that's very interesting, in particular the justification for not allowing repatriation. 

[MrEd]

14 minutes ago, aconnolly said:

Sir Fabian Ware's comments from NZ newspaper The Star, 13 December 1934:

That’s a very interesting clipping, particularly the end sentence about generals and privates, thank you for posting it 

[helpjpl]

12 minutes ago, Gunner 87 said:

Thank you JP, I appreciate you taking the time to write that out. It must have been awful for the parents to have to resort to those tactics just to repatriate their sons. 

 

Hopkins, Sutcliffe and Durie:

https://inconvenientdead.wordpress.com/2018/12/21/twentieth-century-body-snatching-battlefield-grave-robbers/

JP

[MrEd]

10 minutes ago, helpjpl said:

 

Hopkins, Sutcliffe and Durie:

https://inconvenientdead.wordpress.com/2018/12/21/twentieth-century-body-snatching-battlefield-grave-robbers/

JP

Can’t help but wonder what Captain Durie would have wanted? Based on his turning down 3 admin roles and saying he wanted to stay in the army after to war, I wonder if he would have wanted to stay with his comrades? Idle speculation on my part, but and interesting conundrum. 

[ilkley remembers]

@Gunner 87 The newspaper cutting is from the Daily Expess from July 1931 when they decided to resurrect a story that had been doing the rounds for years. It caused something of an outcry particularly as the paper, then fairly left of centre in its outlook, identified wealthy families as the perpetrators spending between £250 to £500 to belgian contractors.

 

Predictably, the right wing press took a different view and repeated the old arguments which had done the rounds 10 years before about state interference, "....conscription of bodies..." etc.

[aconnolly]

Interstingly ,this appeared in a New Zealand newspaper in December 1919, suggesting the concept of exhumation and repatriation was considered in the early period after the Armistice:

Andrew

[Gunner 87]

19 minutes ago, aconnolly said:

Interstingly ,this appeared in a New Zealand newspaper in December 1919, suggesting the concept of exhumation and repatriation was considered in the early period after the Armistice:

Andrew

Cheers Andrew. It's been an interesting post and, as usual, I've learned a great deal. 

[aconnolly]

Likewise Gunner.  Fascinating and very poignant.  Thanks for the initial posting - not a topic that would often come to our attention.  I wonder if the debate partially at least stimulated the war grave photography project various governments undertook?

Andrew

[depaor01]

As someone familiar first-hand and comfortable with the processes of death and grieving,  those stories make for grim reading. Just imagine the logistics. In a suitcase.

[mancpal]

An interesting thread. I’d assume that exhumation and repatriation would have been the reserve of the more affluent whether by legitimate or clandestine means.

How many hundreds of thousands of families couldn’t possibly afford to visit their loved ones grave let alone consider bringing them home by whatever means.

Simon

 

 

l

[aconnolly]

As an aside, the newspaper report here is of a request from a family in the Deep South of the South Island of New Zealand for the exhumation and repatriation of their son within New Zealand.  Private E.H. Barber (#75426) attested (volunteer) as soon as he turned 20 and was in Camp in Palmerston North (in the lower the North Island NZ) with the 40th Reinforcements, entering in July 1918.  He contracted influenza and died on 8 November 1918.  He was buried in the Soldiers Section of the Karori cemetery in Wellington.  He rest there to this day, so obviously his family's request was declined.  There article is from the New Zealand Times, 5 December 1920. 

Andrew

 

Edited 26 June , 2022 by aconnolly

[sunflower]

Article on CWGC site on the illegal exhumation of Captain William Arthur Durie.  https://shapingoursorrow.cwgc.org/anger/anna-durie-a-mothers-defiance/

[michaeldr]

6 hours ago, sunflower said:

Article on CWGC site on the illegal exhumation of Captain William Arthur Durie.  https://shapingoursorrow.cwgc.org/anger/anna-durie-a-mothers-defiance/

Many thanks for that link, which took me on an interesting meander around the subject, the CWGC and Kipling

[battle of loos]

Good evening,
thank you for this information.
I learn one more thing about Loos British Cemetery.
here is an picture of this cemetery at that time :

regards

michel

[Gunner 87]

3 minutes ago, battle of loos said:

Good evening,
thank you for this information.
I learn one more thing about Loos British Cemetery.
here is an picture of this cemetery at that time :

regards

michel

Thank you Michel. It's images like these that bring the sheer amount of loss into perspective. Gunner.

[MrEd]

31 minutes ago, battle of loos said:

Good evening,
thank you for this information.
I learn one more thing about Loos British Cemetery.
here is an picture of this cemetery at that time :

regards

michel

Thank you for posting this. My great Uncle was missing at Loos on that same date 

[Erasmus]

Thanks, helpjpl for the reference to my Blog.

I have looked in some detail at the controversy over the burial of the dead of the Great War. If you are interested it is worth exploring the articles in my blog archives here :

https://inconvenientdead.wordpress.com/2018/12/

A key point to remember is that, prior to WWI, regiments mostly took responsibility of the burial of its men, who were professional soldiers. The War Office treated death as an "occupational hazard". The treatment of the bodies and graves of soldiers was not a high-profile topic.

But with the world war came mass mobilization and conscription of men. The state was taking control of their lives (and deaths) of millions of men in an unprecedented way. Nonetheless, if a soldier died in uniform in Great Britain or Ireland, the WO transported his corpse free of charge to the nearest railway station to the family, who could then manage the burial according to their wishes (and their budget). Sometimes the regiment helped with the departure, and any local units (or even the scouts) might provide an escort or a firing party. Many cemeteries and churchyards offered discounted burial plots for servicemen. This practice continued throughout 1914-18. During the war there was no plan to mark those civilian graves which explains why many Great War graves in UK have fancy private headstones provided by the family.

Clearly, this was not feasible overseas whilst there was a war on, and repatriation of corpses was stopped by 1915. But after the war it was perhaps not unreasonable to think that some sort of repatriation might be allowed.

Post-war the treatment of overseas graves became a hot topic - it wasn't a party political issue of left and right, it was more of a battle between the War Offie and mothers and wives who wanted to reclaim their men.  Fabian Ware came from a Plymouth Brethren background, and he imposed his ideas and his own spartan taste on memorialisation. Coming out of the Victorian era of sentimentality, fancy funerals and highly decorated graves, many families didn't want this plain, uniform memorial for their sons and husbands, curated by someone remote. Who gave them this authority anyway? Many thought this was cruel and heartless. Nor did they want their graves to be maintained by strangers.   As a concession, token personalisation was allowed on the war graves, with a line or two of epitaph. Families were encouraged to select from standard phrases, though they could say anything (as long as it wasn't critical or unpatriotic). The Dominion authorities supported Whitehall in this - in fact, New Zealand didn't even allow an epitaph on their headstones.

The CWGC holds a lot of correspondence from the time on topic. 

France, at first had a similar approach. Its government forbad exhumations from the war cemeteries near the front. But then women started appealing to the government, using the legendary example of Antigone at Troy to shame authorities into allowing access to their graves. The French government conceded, and where bodies could be identified, for a few months it allowed exhumations and reburial of their soldiers back in their commune's cemetery.  The USA likewise allowed repatriation of bodies on request. 

But all appeals to the authorities in the UK and the Dominions fell on deaf ears. The War Office was committed to the grand ouevre of architect-designed war cemeteries, marking the dead in uniform ranks near to where they fell.  Even though this required exhuming and relocating thousands of corpses - just as the families wanted to do. Even if it meant replacing perfectly good headstones with new standard ones.  And while this went on, there were families who tried to intercept bodies that had been dug up and sent en-route to the final war cemetery. 

However, apart from the three instances I have documented in my blog, I have been unable to find examples of body-snatching from British/Dominion military graves. And if it did happen, then by now we would have able to identify graves in England that had been repatriated. There is normally good documentation around a burial and anything out of the usual should surely have come to light by now.

[battle of loos]

good morning,

here is one picture to the Loos British Cemetery now :

michel