Talk:World War I memorials

Article created...

I've taken a stab at this - we seemed to lack a general article on these memorials. I fear there will be a whole bunch of copyediting problems in here, and I've struggled to find anything on Turkish memorials, but at least its a start! Hchc2009 (talk) 19:32, 28 February 2012 (UTC)

Yes, AGAIN; Nothing About Americans

Typical article that obviously must've been written by some typically scummy European; the one reference to the United States is as the "US;" I don't see Great Britain being referred to, even ONCE as "The UK."

Meuse-Argonne American Cemetery and Memorial in France has over 14,000 American buried in it however this is not at all mentioned in this article; oh well, the US was just in the war for less than four-and-a-half months so who cares about them!!!

Makes me sorry we went "Over There." (At this point, a stream of invective/obscenities are streaming from me.)

Satchmo Sings (talk) 11:18, 11 October 2012 (UTC)

I'm afraid you've missed several sections which refer to the United States (although you have a point about nomenclature). The American Battle Monuments Commission oversaw US military graves in a similar fashion.; There was considerable discussion in the US during 1919 about the need to construct a suitably grand, national monument to commemorate the war dead, but the discussions failed to produce a consensus and no project was undertaken; the failure to repatriate British war dead from Europe early in the war had proved domestically controversial, and when the US joined the war in 1917 their government had promised relatives that bodies would be repatriated to the US; around 70 percent of the US war dead were sent back.; The US constructed a Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in 1921; while the idea was clearly a foreign concept, it proved very popular with the American public and by 1936 was attracting over 1.5 m visitors a year and acting as an informal national monument to the war; In America, utilitarian memorials were more popular, and the establishment of the National Committee on Memorial Buildings supported this trend.[97] The American "living memorial" movement was aided by widespread criticism of the war monuments to the American Civil War, which many felt to have been purely executed. Grandiose (me, talk, contribs) 13:01, 11 October 2012 (UTC)

You may also wish to read WP:CIVIL, which addresses the use of "racial, ethnic, sexual, gender-related and religious slurs, and derogatory references to groups such as social classes or nationalities", including Europeans. Hchc2009 (talk) 17:58, 11 October 2012 (UTC)

Laqueur

Notes 53, 109, 111 and 118 referred to a book written by Laqueur, but there is no book in the bibliography written by Laqueur. --Il Dorico (talk) 13:21, 3 June 2014 (UTC)

I'll investigate... I did the first draft of the article and probably missed it out somehow! Hchc2009 (talk) 16:49, 3 June 2014 (UTC)

@Hchc2009: was this meant to be Thomas W. Laqueur ('Memory and Naming in the Great War')? I think this has been incorrectly attributed to 'Fawcett, Thomas W.' in the bibliography in this article. I am afraid I have no idea who Fawcett is! Carcharoth (talk) 03:08, 3 January 2017 (UTC)

I think you're right - must have cut and pasted it from an article in which I used Fawcett! Sorry about that... :) Hchc2009 (talk) 07:19, 3 January 2017 (UTC)

Thanks. I think we have an article on him: Thomas W. Laqueur. I am the sort of person that checks to see if we have articles on the authors in the bibliography... You'd be surprised how many there are (e.g. Max Egremont and David Reynolds and Jay Winter). Some people like having links in author bibliographies, some don't. Would you like links added or not? Carcharoth (talk) 08:33, 3 January 2017 (UTC)

I'm relaxed on links either way, provided we're consistent. :) Hchc2009 (talk) 09:11, 3 January 2017 (UTC)

OK. Listing them here as I check through them (this is from the first half - some are the editors of the collections the works appear in): Mabel Berezin; Nicholas J. Saunders; Alan Borg; Laird Boswell; Gunnar Brands; Maria Todorova; Mark Connelly; Max Egremont; Thomas W. Laqueur; R. J. B. Bosworth; Delia Falconer; John Gillis (historian); Norman Hillmer; Ken Inglis; George Mosse; Holger Herwig; Annette Becker; David Reynolds (British historian); Jay Winter. Carcharoth (talk) 17:41, 3 January 2017 (UTC) Updated with rest of list. Carcharoth (talk) 18:19, 3 January 2017 (UTC)

Looks good to me. Hchc2009 (talk) 18:09, 3 January 2017 (UTC)

Added with this edit. Carcharoth (talk) 18:31, 3 January 2017 (UTC)

Add more information re: the Canadian National Vimy Memorial

This is an extremely long article; I do not see a mention of this important Canadian First World War memorial in France. Should we not add at least some information about it?

The Canadian National Vimy Memorial is a memorial site in France dedicated to the memory of Canadian Expeditionary Force members killed during the First World War. It also serves as the place of commemoration for First World War Canadian soldiers killed or presumed dead in France who have no known grave.

King Edward VIII unveiled it on 26 July 1936 in the presence of French President Albert Lebrun and more than 50,000 Canadian and French veterans and their families. Peter K Burian (talk) 15:09, 31 March 2017 (UTC)

OK, I found one very brief mention of it under Battlefields, without the Wiki Link. And a photo of the models of the plans that were submitted, under Commissioning memorials

Frankly, this would be a preferable photo (the plan for the memorial that was actually built):

As a Canadian I do not feel this is adequate. Especially on the 100th anniversary.

The commemoration of the 100th anniversary of the Battle of Vimy Ridge was scheduled for April 9 to 10, 2017 in France, with Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau and Governor General David Johnston planning to attend from Canada. Others scheduled at the cerermony included Kent Hehr, Minister of Veterans Affairs and Associate Minister of National Defence, Harjit Singh Sajjan, Minister of National Defence, and General Jonathan Vance, Chief of Defence Staff for the Canadian Armed Forces. Members of the Royal Family scheduled to attend include The Prince of Wales, representing Her Majesty The Queen, The Duke of Cambridge and Prince Harry. "Prime Minister to travel to France for the 100th anniversary of the Battle of Vimy Ridge". Prime Minister of Canada. Government of Canada. 24 March 2017. Retrieved 31 March 2017. Peter K Burian (talk) 15:17, 31 March 2017 (UTC)

I don't know if you read the whole article but it's very much an overview of the concept of war memorials to WWI, rather than an attempt to document all the most significant memorials, so it contains mentions of individual memorials where they illustrate the concept being discussed. Which is how you end up with several tiny memorials being mentioned—it's not a reflection of the significance of an given memorial. The weight Vimy Ridge gets seems proportional to that given to other major memorials—Thipeval, for example, has only a few passing mentions (like Vimy); Arras isn't even mentioned. Even the Menin Gate, arguably the most famous of them all, doesn't get a lot more weight. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 16:59, 31 March 2017 (UTC)

Very much as HJ Mitchell notes, the article covers all World War I memorials, large and small, from all countries - it an overview. The Vimy Memorial is mentioned in several places and has two pictures associated with it, which seems adequate for a single memorial. Hchc2009 (talk) 17:20, 31 March 2017 (UTC)

OK. I made them Wiki links to Canadian National Vimy Memorial Peter K Burian (talk) 17:27, 31 March 2017 (UTC)

Crosses

I'm rather confused by some of this talk about crosses being somehow indicative of Roman Catholic belief or affiliation alone. One source--and not three, as indicated--apparently suggests that the Celtic Cross had no Roman Catholic connotation, but sadly I do not have access to the book. I cannot fathom what this author means. In Ireland, the Celtic Cross is a matter not only of early church iconography, but of Roman Catholic identity. In Protestant majority Northern Ireland, the Celtic Cross is not so widely embraced.

In particular, in the Notes section, there is a clear misunderstanding. The source material refers to the crucifix and not the cross. The point made is that the crucified Christ, as an image, is not a reminder of Roman Catholic practice but of ritualism, a feature shared with the established Anglican Church. Non-conformists would likely prefer the simple, unadorned cross. It was because of non-conformist preferences, for the most part, that the Stone of Remembrance was never to be referred to as an altar.

How does one clean this up? I am unfortunately unfamiliar with how possibly contentious material might be edited (in the hope for clarity and to objective ends, of course.) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2605:A000:BFC0:21:5982:6C45:FB78:CCBA (talk) 21:29, 21 April 2017 (UTC)

What is your actual proposed change to the text? Alex King (p.129) definitely does talk about crosses btw. Hchc2009 (talk) 07:16, 23 April 2017 (UTC)

Sovereignty of the Gallipoli Peninsula

I'm disappointed that my attempt to clarify the sovereignty of the Gallipoli Peninsula was undone without any discussion. I agree the version I found on the site was easier to read, but it is factually incorrect.

I had hoped to assist the effort here with a bit more of an explanation of the Ottoman Empire's memorialisation of its war dead, but what would be the point if such unthinking resistance can be expected? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2605:A000:BFC0:21:5982:6C45:FB78:CCBA (talk) 15:28, 22 April 2017 (UTC)

Could you suggest an alternative form of words in a summary style that still captures the point of the sentence - which is about the whole of the battlefield being turned into a memorial? The problem with starting to draw distinctions between the date when the Treaty of Lausanne was signed (1923) and the date when it was put into effect (1924) etc. is that it moves us away from a summary style. Similarly, drawing out the precise details of Article 129 of the treaty (which I think covers the slightly complicated "granting" of the land to the British Empire, but the retention of sovereignty by the Turkish state) is going into a lot of detail that doesn't fit in this article. Hchc2009 (talk) 16:23, 22 April 2017 (UTC)

One might try: "Additionally, the Treaty of Lausanne (1923) designated the Imperial War Graves Commission as the body responsible for the management of the Gallipoli Peninsula's cemeteries and memorials. Overall control and sovereignty of the peninsula resided with the new Turkish Republic, however, and Turkey began establishing monuments on a large scale beginning in 1960 with the opening of the Çanakkale Martyrs' Memorial."

The issue of the treaty's effective date is of concern, but if the standard is to list its date of signing, then 1923 will suffice. Great Britain, the last to ratifiy the treaty, however, did not do so until 1924.

The larger issue of sovereignty comes about in recent years with the increased Turkish interest in the peninsula and their nation's establishing an independent interpretation of the conflict. As you may know, the Turkish government declared the peninsula a national park in 1973 and has continued to make modifications and improvements to the area. (See http://www.milliparklar.gov.tr/kitap/55/55.pdf)

I am trying to steer clear of the controversial elements involved, but further discussion of how the Ottoman Empire commemorated--and the Turkish Republic commemorates--the dead leads us to discuss nationalist and religious perceptions that the allied and associated powers have largly internalized and often take for granted.2605:A000:BFC0:21:5982:6C45:FB78:CCBA (talk) 01:44, 23 April 2017 (UTC)

How about "In Turkey, the entire battlefield of Gallipoli was given over to the IWGC after 1923, and the area was turned into an extended memorial to the war dead." - keeps it simple and focused on the subject of the article (the memorial), and avoids the need to start quoting treaties...? Hchc2009 (talk) 07:11, 23 April 2017 (UTC)

Seemingly a decided prejudice against Catholics

My correction regarding the Cenotaph should stand. The assertion that ministerial protests were made against the Cenotaph having Catholic connotations is patently wrong. It was the established Church of England, and others, that pushed for the Cenotaph having religious iconography. The Prime Minister, as I have tried to explain, ensured that the monument would remain secular in nature.

The stubborn refusal to discuss changes to this page before reverting to previous text is maddening. My understanding is that this page belongs to the wider public and not the page's first author.

How does one complain? Is there any point in trying to assist in an objective way?2605:A000:BFC0:21:5982:6C45:FB78:CCBA (talk) 01:48, 23 April 2017 (UTC)

As per the cited source... David Lloyd writes "Mond held the same views, stating that a catafalque was a 'purely Catholic idea and might not appeal to the British public generally.' Similar reasons for rejecting the idea were raised at a meeting of the Cabinet of 4 July... Despite this, Lloyd George prevailed, and Sir Edwin Lutyens was asked to design a temporary memorial to the dead." If you feel there is a problem with this, then of course raise it on the talk page - but do be aware of Wikipedia:Assume good faith and Wikipedia:BOLD, revert, discuss cycle. Hchc2009 (talk) 22:55, 22 April 2017 (UTC)

I stand by my assertion that discussion should occur before new edits are reversed. (Barring dissimulation, of course.) I am unfamiliar with the word 'catafalque' being used as you suggest. Further, the reference I cite is one that is available to everyone and written by an Emeritus professor at Edinburgh Napier University. More to the point, it correctly identifies the established church as attempting to manipulate the iconography.

I have already made a number of suggestions here that I think are useful, pertinent, and accurate. I see you as hampering progress by discouraging changes that apparently don't hold up to your personal standards and prejudices. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2605:A000:BFC0:21:5982:6C45:FB78:CCBA (talk) 23:08, 22 April 2017 (UTC)

The word 'catafalque' is quoted from David Lloyd's book. If it helps at all, the National Secular Society article you've cited by Norman Bonney, Emeritus Professor and Member of the Council of Management of the National Secular Society, similarly says "At Prime Minister Lloyd George’s insistence, it was also decided to follow the planned French example with the troops marching by and saluting a catafalque (a raised platform on which the coffin of a dead person rests)... Albert Mond, the Minister of Works, thought that the catafalque was a purely catholic idea and might not appeal to the British public generally. There clearly, then, was considerable opposition to the troops marching by and saluting a catafalque and, although Prime Minister Lloyd George’s idea for a secular monument to the dead of the war prevailed in cabinet." (Bonney, pp.7-8)

Again, I'd ask you to resist calling other editors prejudiced - it doesn't help the discussion. Hchc2009 (talk) 23:23, 22 April 2017 (UTC)

I tried to add this while you were typing apparently:

I would like to add here, also, that the National Secular Society is simply the publisher here. I don't understand why something published by Bantam Books, for instance, would be seen as somehow more objective.

To the point about a catafalque, one finds "Following deliberations by the Peace Celebrations Committee, Lutyens was invited to Downing Street. There, the British Prime Minister, David Lloyd George, proposed that the monument should be a catafalque, like the one intended for the Arc de Triomphe in Paris for the corresponding Victory Parade in France, but Lutyens proposed instead that the design be based on a cenotaph." here: https://wiki.riteme.site/wiki/The_Cenotaph,_Whitehall. (I presume the source is valid.) If Mond objected to a catafalque, it would have been before the monument was even designed. It's possible that someone might consider the cenotaph a catafalque if one is conscious of the monument holding an empty tomb, but wasn't the tomb removed from the original structure?

Regardless, the larger point is that the monument would not hold any religious symbolism at all. If you will remember, the monument was not even dedicated (so as to avoid offending non-Christian sensibilities.)

I'll read your comment now.2605:A000:BFC0:21:5982:6C45:FB78:CCBA (talk) 01:48, 23 April 2017 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2605:A000:BFC0:21:5982:6C45:FB78:CCBA (talk) 00:01, 23 April 2017 (UTC)

I appreciate the discussion here, though I am disappointed that you did not address my objection. Again, I find it discouraging and counterproductive to reverse an edit without some discussion.

As for sources, the word you have retained is "Catholic" spelled with a majuscule. This is rather different than "catholic" spelled with a lower-case "c" as provided in the article you seem to reject.

The question remains as to why you hold on to a reference that does not do justice to the real issue at stake. Soldiers would not necessarily be comfortable saluting an object on which their were Christian icons. The decision was that the cenotaph be secular in appearance.

As for prejudice, I would ask why no one has addressed my earlier concern regarding Celtic crosses and the like?2605:A000:BFC0:21:5982:6C45:FB78:CCBA (talk) 01:48, 23 April 2017 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2605:A000:BFC0:21:5982:6C45:FB78:CCBA (talk) 00:16, 23 April 2017 (UTC)

Apparently I haven't been signing my posts on these talk pages. I hope that hasn't contributed to any misunderstanding.2605:A000:BFC0:21:5982:6C45:FB78:CCBA (talk) 01:48, 23 April 2017 (UTC)

In terms of some of your points:

• "Catholic" versus "catholic". As the article cites David Lloyd, who quotes Mond directly and uses "Catholic", the text currently uses the same. By the looks of it, Bonney has just taken the quote marks away from Mond's words and lower-cased the word.
• "cenotaph" versus "catafalque" - we could ping User:HJ Mitchell, who has been doing work on Lutyens work?
• On reliable sources, the key policy guidelines are at WP:RELIABLE. The Wikipedia is not, ironically, a reliable source, as it is self-published. It also explains the risks is drawing on self-published sources, including those published by groups with particular approaches to an issue (e.g. the Church of England writing on religious history, or the National Secular Society writing on the history of secularism). Typically if a fact is important and well established, it should be possible to find a high quality source published by an independent body.
• If we can identify a reliable source, I'd be very supportive of the term "secular" being added into the text. e.g. "A new, permanent cenotaph designed by Edwin Lutyens, deliberately secular in design, was commissioned"?
• I'll also remind you once again (and finally) to cease with the accusations of religious prejudice. Wikipedia:No personal attacks is very clear on this. Hchc2009 (talk) 07:09, 23 April 2017 (UTC)

I am baffled as to why you select some things to dispute while the larger issue remains. I am trying to assist in this project and have even offered suggestions for discussion that are apparently ignored by you.You seem to have taken on this page as your personal property and this just isn`t conducive to the material`s betterment. While you hang on stubbornly to material to which I do not have access, you don`t seem to be interested in the larger issues at hand. Instead, we end of quibbling. (It`s unseemly for both of us.)

I apologize for my suggesting that you personally are antithetic to Catholicism. My realization is that you are wedded to material that may be so and that you apparently don`t care to go further in your investigation. It`s a failure on your part, but I understand that you are not bound by any agreement to be wiser than your source material.

The issues that concern me most are as follow:

1. Reverting to earlier text without discussion is simply counterproductive, barring attempts at dissimulation, of course. This is my complaint, you understand. You ought not be the only arbiter here. I think you've done solid work here, and I respect that, but you don't seem an expert on the matters at hand. Nor am I!

As an example, I have wondered what one ought to do about material that is supported by a dead link. (I don't know if any exist on this page.) One could very well argue that unsupported material should simply be removed, but assuming the goodwill of contributors, this would be a draconian step. Instead, notice should be made. Time should pass. Another solution might be found.

2. Sources are cited so that they can be investigated and considered by the reader. I personally think you are taking on too much authority in discarding some publishers' output. Erich von Dänike's strange ideas have been published by reputable firms, but that lends no credence to his work. And if the policy here is to ignore self-published work, does that mean we must discard academic papers presented at conferences but never formally published? (Academia simply doesn't work that way.)

3. Using your own standard of providing a summary view of the topic, I might suggest that mention of crosses and catafalques are unnecessary and undesirable. Myself, I'm all for additional discussion, but I object to this heavy tool of "summary only" being used to simply halt progress or to discourage edits. For instance, you might consider the sovereignty of the Gallipoli Peninsula being unimportant, but I assure you it is of central importance to many Turkish citizens. That the matter came under review by the Australian Parliament within the last decade surely makes that clear.

I could go on, but I won't. I don't want to go too far down this path without some sense of your wanting to remain open-minded. I welcome further discussion, but would ask that you address the points I made some days ago. There is a sentence or two regarding Gallipoli that I provided that might serve as a starting point.

Incidentally, I have discovered a monument placed in Israel that honors the war dead of the Allies, Germans, and Ottoman Empire from the Great War. Perhaps you know of it; it was placed by the CWGS in 1967 (I think.) I believe it deserves notice in this page, but I'm certainly not going to bother with it if you are intent on removing everything I suggest.2605:A000:BFC0:21:5982:6C45:FB78:CCBA (talk) 14:23, 23 April 2017 (UTC)

Regarding the Cenotaph, I have found a source which I think will satisfy all. I quote it:

"Upon [Lloyd George's] return to London he discussed this with Sir Alfred Mond, the First Commissioner of the Board of Works and convinced him that the work should be executed by 'some prominent artist'. Mond had already sounded out Sir Edwin Lutyens, the eminent architect at the beginning of June. (One of Lutyens' designs for the Cenotaph, in the collection of the Imperial War Museum, is dated 4th June 1919). At the beginning of July, Lutyens was invited to Downing Street and asked to design a non-denominational structure for the parade, to be designed and built in two weeks."

It can be found here: http://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20140805133045/http://www.veterans-uk.info/remembrance/cenoptaph.html

Somewhat strangely, an author for the Imperial War Museum claims: "In 1919, British architect Edwin Landseer Lutyens (1898-1944) was approached by Sir Alfred Mond, First Commissioner of Works, to design a catafalque – a raised platform to hold a casket or tomb – to stand on Whitehall." http://www.iwm.org.uk/history/what-is-the-cenotaph2605:A000:BFC0:21:5982:6C45:FB78:CCBA (talk) 15:29, 23 April 2017 (UTC)

Non-denominational bit added as suggested, referenced to the MOD page. Hchc2009 (talk) 17:13, 23 April 2017 (UTC)

Trying to reason with you seems hopeless. Enjoy your playground.2605:A000:BFC0:21:5982:6C45:FB78:CCBA (talk) 18:34, 23 April 2017 (UTC)