This Descriptive Account of the work of the Imperial War Graves Commission was written by Mr. Rudyard Kipling at the Commission’s request. The Illustrations showing the cemeteries and memorials as they will appear when completed are by Mr. Douglas Macpherson. T HE Commission consists of:— The Secretary of State for War. The Secretary of State for the Colonies. The Secretary of State for India. The First Commissioner of Works. The Hon. Sir George Perley, K.C.M.G. (appointed by the Government of C

T HE origin and development of the Imperial War Graves Commission is very simple. In the first days of the war the different armies engaged created organisations, under the direction of the War Office, to register, mark, and tend the graves of British soldiers, as well as to answer inquiries from relatives, and, where possible, to send them photographs of the graves. Later, a National Committee was constituted, which, on the suggestion of the Prince of Wales, who took a keen personal interest in

T HE finance of the Commission is Imperial. All parts of the Empire have generously and unreservedly promised to bear their share of the expenses. The Imperial War Conference, having considered the proposals of the Commission, passed the following resolution on June 17, 1918: “The Conference desires to place on record its appreciation of the Labours of the Imperial War Graves Commission, and is in favour of the cost of carrying out the decisions of the Commission being borne by the respective Go

T HE Commission instructed Sir Frederic Kenyon, K.C.B., to report how these aims could best be realised, and he, after consulting very fully with the relatives, representatives of the Services, religion and art, and knowing the practical limitations, particularly in obtaining labour, for carrying out such a vast undertaking, recommended that in each cemetery there should stand a Cross of Sacrifice, and an altarlike Stone of Remembrance, and that the headstones of the graves should be of uniform

I N addition to the name and rank upon the headstone, the Commission feel that relatives should, if they wish, add a short inscription of their own choice as an expression of personal feeling and affection. These inscriptions will be at the relatives’ expense, and, to avoid unduly crowding the stones with very small lettering, which, besides being difficult to read, does not weather well, it has been found necessary to restrict the length of the inscription to sixty-six letters. [A] [A] In count

T HIS matter is naturally of the deepest concern to the relatives of those whose bodies have never been recovered or identified, or whose graves, once made, have been destroyed by later battles. Their number is not small, and Sir Frederic Kenyon has suggested that the best way to record their memory would be to place a tablet on the walls or cloisters at the cemetery nearest to the spot where it is presumed they have lost their lives. In the case of officers and men in the Flying Corps, the plac

T HE symbols of their faith will also be carved on the headstones of the soldiers of the Indian Armies who fought beside their comrades from England and throughout the Empire in France and Belgium in 1914-16; and of the Indian Labour Corps who have since worked and taken the risks of life behind the lines. A committee of the Commission has decided upon the form that these symbols should take, and has further recommended that a Mohammedan mosque and Hindu temple should be erected in France for re

A FTER so many years of fighting over densely populated and civilised countries like France and Belgium, it is inevitable that there must be single graves and groups in positions where, when the life of the land goes forward again, they cannot be reached or tended. Some lie in what were once town or village thoroughfares, and will be so again; others by the side of railway stations and goods yards, houses or factories, in arable or pasture fields, parks, gardens and the like. The objections to l

I N view of the enormous number (over half a million) of our dead in France alone, the removal of bodies to England would be impossible, even were there a general desire for it. But the overwhelming majority of relatives are content that their kin should lie—officers and men together—in the countries that they have redeemed. The Allied nations, too, have freely given their land to our dead for ever, and that offer has been accepted by the Governments. To allow exhumation and removal in the few c

M EMORIALS to commemorate the parts borne by particular armies, divisions, or regiments in campaigns and battles, such as, to name only a few, the Canadians at Ypres, the South Africans at Delville Wood, the Australians at Amiens, the British at the breaking of the Hindenburg line, will be advised upon by a fully representative military committee, and it is to be hoped that the best art of the Empire will give its services and advice in the designing of them....

B UT the work so far has only been blocked out, and there is room and welcome for suggestions of every kind from the public throughout the world, whose servants the Commission are. For example, it has been suggested that the entrance to individual cemeteries should carry a text or inscription, and it has been decided that monuments should be erected to the dead whose graves are unknown, of a special form which has yet to be settled. These are points, among others, upon which the Commission would

M EANTIME , the long and difficult business of identification and registration goes forward still on all fronts. The various architects to whose charge the cemeteries have been allotted are preparing their designs for the planting and the building required in France, and steps are being taken to prepare dignified and characteristic designs for our cemeteries in the East and elsewhere. All this can be effected in reasonable time; but there is no possibility of expediting the delivery of the heads