A Most Beautiful Token
June 2024
November 1920, France
It is a foggy morning. From contoured earth surrounded by young saplings, four unknown bodies are exhumed from different places in France and placed in recently made coffins draped by flag. Brought into a chapel, everyone but two exits. All is quiet. In the chapel’s solemn stillness, a nicely uniformed man closes his eyes. He takes his time. Not knowing where each body is from, laying his hands on one of the coffins, he says: “This is the one.”
The anonymous man rested in his simple coffin overnight as preparations are made for his long journey home. A home for which he yearned for several years. The next afternoon, he was transported 80 kilometers to the ancient city of Boulogne. Citizens and uniformed men alike stood at attention in the streets, honoring the man no one knew. The castle’s library is transformed into a makeshift chapel for him, where he again rests. Flanked by many candles, he is given a vigil overnight. The next morning, undertakers come in to transfer him to a casket of oak from the royal palace at Hampton. The king himself had specially chosen 16th century swords to adorn his new casket. In the late morning, all the bells of Boulogne rang and cavalry trumpets sang. Drawn by six black horses, he was escorted to the harbor processed by a mile-long gathering of people he never knew, led by a thousand children and escorted by the French military.
A somber atmosphere overcame the waterfront. The procession filed into the harbor. A warship awaited him. Surrounded by everyone, from children to the highest ranking, he is unloaded from the carriage and transferred to the ship. Ferdinand Foch, Marshal of France, saluted him as he is carried in, when the HMS Verdun pipes a call only afforded to admirals. They set sail to home as the those left in France look on.
On the 10th of November, he comes home approaching the white cliffs of England to a 19-gun salute, fired for Field Marshals. He is loaded onto a train car numbered 132, the same that carried an Anglican saint to her rest, and transported to Victoria Station, where a plaque now commemorates the spot.
On the 11th of November, 1920, two years to the day after the flames that engulfed the world were put out, he is given a funeral normally reserved for monarchs. Again drawn by six black horses, a massive procession marches through London on its way to Westminster Abbey, where the greats of Britain lie. As they pass by Hyde Park, another Field Marshal’s salute is fired. Passing Whitehall, the king unveils the Cenotaph, the empty tomb to the unknown of the Great War.
He is carried into Westminster Abbey, flanked by a guard of honor of 100 recipients of the Victoria Cross. His guests of honor are 100 women who lost all of their husbands and sons. In the abbey, he is interred in earth brought from each of the major battlefields. Tens of thousands of mourners file through the abbey as servicemen stand guard.
He is given a capstone of black Belgian marble which reads:
Beneath this stone rests the body
Of a British warrior
Unknown by name or rank
Brought from France to lie among
The most illustrious of the land
And buried here on Armistice Day
11 Nov: 1920, in the presence of
His Majesty King George V
His Ministers of State
The Chiefs of his forces
And a vast concourse of the nation
Thus are commemorated the many
Multitudes who during the Great
War of 1914 – 1918 gave the most that
Man can give life itself
For God
For King and country
For loved ones home and empire
For the sacred cause of justice and
The freedom of the world
They buried him among the kings because he
Had done good toward God and toward
His house
Buried in a place where men can literally walk over kings, he is the only one no man can walk over — a man no one knows.
David Lloyd George later said: “The Cenotaph is the token of our mourning as a nation; the Grave of the Unknown Warrior is the token of our mourning as individuals.”
—
I can only wonder what kind of a life did this man live? Was he from the lower class? Was he a temporary gentleman? Surely, he would never have believed you if you said he would be given a funeral only fit for kings. Granted he is the only one no one can walk over, perhaps he’s even above them.
The story of this man really struck me.
