Thiepval Memorial to the Missing of the Somme

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Thiepval Memorial to the Missing
Commonwealth War Graves Commission

For the dead of World War I with no known grave
Unveiled	31 July 1932 by Edward, Prince of Wales
Location	near Thiepval, northern France
Designed by	Sir Edwin Lutyens
Total commemorated	72,090
Statistics source: CWGC

A few of the names of the missing

The Thiepval Memorial to the Missing of the Somme is a major war memorial to British and South African men who died in the World War I Battle of the Somme and who have no known grave. It is located in the village of Thiepval.

The Memorial was built approximately 200 metres to the south-east of the former Thiepval Chateau, which was located on lower ground, by the side of Thiepval Wood. The grounds of the original chateau having been unsuitable as it would have required the relocation of gravesites located around the numerous medical aid stations dug during the war.

The memorial, which dominates the rural scene, has sixteen piers of red brick, faced with Portland stone. It is 150 feet (46 m) high, with foundations 19 feet (6 m) thick; required due to extensive wartime tunneling beneath the structure. Designed by Sir Edwin Lutyens, the memorial was built between 1928 and 1932 and is the biggest British battle memorial in the world. It was inaugurated by the Prince of Wales (later King Edward VIII) in the presence of Albert Lebrun, President of France, on 31 July 1932.

The memorial is reserved for those missing, or unidentified, soldiers who have no known grave. A large inscription on the memorial reads: Here are recorded names of officers and men of the British Armies who fell on the Somme battlefields July 1915 February 1918 but to whom the fortune of war denied the known and honoured burial given to their comrades in death. On the Portland Stone piers are engraved the names of over 72,000 men who were lost in the Somme battles between July 1916 and March 1918, most of whom died in the first Battle of the Somme between 1 July and 4 November 1916. Consequently, when the remains of a soldier listed on the memorial are found and identified, he is given a funeral with full military honours and his remains buried in the closest cemetery to his location; his name is then removed from the memorial. This has resulted in numerous gaps in the lists of names.

The Thiepval Memorial also serves as an Anglo-French battle memorial to commemorate the joint nature of the 1916 offensive. In further recognition of this, a cemetery containing 300 British Commonwealth and 300 French graves lies at the foot of the memorial. Many of the soldiers buried here are unknown. The British Commonwealth graves are rectangular and made of white stone, while the French graves have grey stone crosses.

A visitors' centre opened in 2004, where the Royal British Legion have a representative.

Each year on 1 July a major ceremony is held at the memorial. There is also a ceremony on the 11 November, beginning at 1045 CET.