In his latest book, the veteran and author uncovers the origins of the Tomb of the Unknown Warrior in Westminster Abbey
Featured image by Simon & Schuster UK
(Photo: Simon & Schuster UK)
In 1920, the remains of an unidentified serviceman of the First World War were secretly disinterred, transported to London and laid to rest at Westminster Abbey, at the west end of the nave. For a nation still mourning the colossal sacrifice and loss during the war, the tomb served to represent over 500 thousand war dead with no known resting place, for bereaved families and loved ones to visit.
The history of the Tomb of the Unknown Warrior, and how it can relate to our modern experiences of war, is the subject of the latest book and nationwide theatre tour by John Nichol, The Unknown Warrior. He spoke with History of War about the key figures involved in creating the Unknown Warrior, as well as his own personal journey discovering the horrific experiences of those on the frontline and the bereaved on the homefront, tragically common in conflicts generations apart.
John Nichol’s new book will be published by Simon & Schuster in September. His national theatre tour, telling the story behind the Unknown Warrior’s tomb in Westminster Abbey, runs from 4 October. For more information, visit www.johnnichollive.com
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What did you know about the background to the Unknown Warrior prior to your research?
I’m not sure that I knew very much at all, other than there is a Tomb of the Unknown Warrior in Westminster Abbey. It wasn’t until one day, which I describe in the book, where a World War Two veteran was telling me about it, that I realised I knew almost nothing. That was the spark. That was the thing that said to me: ‘There really is a story to be told about how it happened and the people that made it happen.’
At school I only did three years of History because I dropped it, so I didn’t know much about the First World War at all, to my shame. The big thing that came out when I was investigating, that really brought it all home, was this concept that over a million British Empire soldiers were killed, and over half a million have no known grave. I was astonished by this.
(Photo: Simon & Schuster UK)
My investigation into how that could be was just incredible. For example, discovering the ways a body could be lost: blown apart; buried in a grave and the marker lost; buried and the person who buried the person blown apart and so all records were lost. There were bodies that were buried, then blown up again from their resting place by the ongoing battles. There were moving battle lines that meant trenches were dug through graves. It really was a journey of discovery for me.
“There were bodies that were buried, then blown up again from their resting place by the ongoing battles. There were moving battle lines that meant trenches were dug through graves. It really was a journey of discovery for me.”
What was it like visiting the battlefields in France, which remain the final resting places of thousands of unknown?
High Wood, which opens the book, and the theatre show, was a place that was fought over endlessly. Depending on which account you believe, there are conceivably hundreds, possibly thousands of bodies still unrecovered from that area. I don’t believe in ghosts, but visiting High Wood I found it quite haunting but really quite moving to think what had gone on there a mere hundred or so years earlier. On a number of occasions I thought ‘unknown warriors lie right beneath my feet.’ High Wood, which is relatively small, was just a tiny part of the Battle of the Somme, which was just one battle during the whole of the First World War. Think about the numbers involved; it is an astonishing piece of history.
Related: Somme 2016: How battlefield surgeons treated shellshock, shrapnel and gas
You also spoke with veterans and military families connected with both WWI but also with more recent conflicts such as in the Falklands and Afghanistan. Why was it important to include these modern accounts?
Today I think it is almost impossible to think of an unidentified casualty from British forces, so in the book I try to bring the story up to date by investigating other aspects… In the Falklands, there were men who went down on ships whose remains were never recovered. So their families have no resting place.
When I spoke to a padre from the Falklands War, he talked about burying unknown Argentinian soldiers, because they had no identification. I’d been to the Argentinian cemetery and seen those graves, but I just hadn’t thought about it. I’ve read the inscriptions – ‘An Argentinian soldier known unto God’ but it hadn’t really registered how it had happened.
(Photo: Simon & Schuster UK)
The story of the Unknown Warrior is about death, memorialising and recognizing sacrifice. That still goes on today, but we tend not to think that much about it. When we first went to Iraq in 2003 and somebody was killed, there was no grand parade. It wasn’t until one or two people went to Royal Wootton Bassett to acknowledge the sacrifice and the death of a loved one. Royal Wootton Bassett marked those ceremonies so incredibly. I spoke to a lady who lost her husband in Afghanistan and she talked to me about the reality of that ceremony, the reality of having a body back, and the reality of always wondering if her loved one was dead… That was really quite moving. It’s this concept about sacrifice, about the need to remember, the need to acknowledge and mark the death of either a warrior or a loved one. That still very much lives with us today.
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To read our full interview with John Nichols, including his thoughts on the Cenotaph, how the idea of memoralising the unknown soldier came about and the process of selecting the unknown warrior, pick up issue 137 of History of War