The Unknown Warrior

I am sure that you can all visualise the Grave of the Unknown Warrior in Westminster Abbey and have stood beside the grave and looked down on it. It was the idea of Rev David Railton, a Church of England clergyman and a Military Chaplin. When serving in Northern France in 1916 he was very moved one day to see, in a garden in a village near Armentieres, a rough wooden cross inscribed with the words ‘Unknown British Soldier’.

Inside Westminster Abbey. Mark Stevenson

In 1920 when Rev Railton was back in England, he wrote to Dean Ryle at Westminster Abbey with his idea that a body be returned from the Western Front and be buried in Westminster Abbey. Dean Ryle succeeded in persuading the Prime Minister, David Lloyd George, and the Chief of the Imperial General Staff and Field Marshall Henry Wilson to adopt the idea. These men won over the Cabinet and King George V.

Four bodies were exhumed from four battlefields: The Somme, Arras, Aisle and Ypres.

On the 9th of November 1920 they were all taken to a temporary Chapel at St Pol Sur Ternoise. They were put into four coffins and a senior officer closed his eyes and put his hand on one of the coffins. This was how the Unknown Warrior was chosen. The other three were reburied. The identity of ‘The Unknown Warrior’ or from which battlefield he came is unknown. The idea was that it should be a British Soldier in an English Oak Coffin, buried in French soil and covered with a slab of Belgian marble. The special outer coffin was made of oak from Hampton Court. On top was fixed a medieval crusaders sword from the collection in the Tower of London, and the coffin was covered with the Union Flag that had been used by Rev Railton to make temporary altars on the battlefields. The coffin was then transported on a gun carriage in a mile long procession 90 miles west of Boulogne to sail aboard HMS Verdun for Dover. With the coffin went 6 barrels of soil from Ypres. When HMS Verdun was halfway across the Chanel it was met by six destroyers to escort it to Dover. After a 19-gun salute it left by train for Victoria Station in London where it stayed overnight.

At 9.15am on the 11th November, Armistice Day, there was a gun carriage procession to Westminster Abbey. The coffin was again covered by Rev Railton with the Union Flag on which was placed a steel helmet and fire arms. There were 6 black horses and 12 of the Nation’s highest ranking officers walking along side, with 400 ex-servicemen behind. The route went down the Mall and Whitehall to the newly erected Cenotaph.

King George V placed a wreath of red roses and bay leaves on the coffin. After a hymn and a prayer Big Ben chimed 11 o’clock and the King pressed a button which released two Union Flags and the Cenotaph was unveiled. Two minutes silence descended. Then the last post sounded and the King laid a wreath. He and his three sons followed the procession to the North Door of Westminster Abbey. Amongst the hundreds of Service men in the congregation were also Queen Mary, the Queen of Spain and the Queen of Norway together with mothers and widows of those killed. The nave was lined by more than 100 holders of the Victoria Cross.

Tomb of the Unknown Warrior, Westminster Abbey. Mark Stevenson 

When the coffin had been lowered into the grave the King sprinkled earth from Flanders on to the coffin and the grave was filled with French soil. Temporarily it was sealed by a stone but in 1921 it would be replaced by Belgian marble with a brass inscription made by melted down cartridges from WW1. Artificial poppies which had become a symbol of remembrance later surrounded the grave. Poppies were the first flowers to be seen to grow in the disturbed soils on battlefields.

John McCrae. Public domain via Wikimedia Commons

A Canadian surgeon and soldier in WW1, John McCrae, had written a poem with the lines:

In Flanders fields the poppies blow

Between the crosses, row on row,

That mark our place; and in the sky

The larks, still bravely singing fly

Scare heard amid the guns below.

The Bell of HMS Verdun, Westminster Abbey. Mark Stevenson

Close to The Unknown Warriors Grave is displayed his VC and The Medal of Honour (the highest honour of USA), the Bell of HMS Verdun, and a stone to remember Dean Ryle who composed the inscription on the Marble and arranged everything. The Union Flag used by Rev Railton also hangs nearby.

The Rev Railton was awarded a MC. He was born in North London and in 1920 he was a Vicar in Margate. He moved to several parishes. He volunteered in WWII but he was then 55 and was turned down by the Army. Despite this he later worked for the RAF part time visiting air stations before retiring to his home in Scotland in 1945. He died in 1955 and is buried at St Brides Church, Ballachulish.

The French buried their ‘Unknown Warrior’ beneath the Arche de Triomphe at 11am on 11th November 1920 at the same time as here in London. In the next few years other countries followed what had been started by Rev Railton.
The Royal British Legion was founded in 1921. The first poppies were made of silk in France which took a lot of time. The British Legion factory in South London used paper. On the 24th of May 2023 it was announced that all poppies were now to be made entirely of paper.

WE WILL REMEMBER THEM

About the Author

Helen Tozer was a Tutor on the London Blue Badge Guide Training Course between 1980-2002, covering all aspects of guiding in London plus communication skills. She herself qualified as a London Blue Badge Tourist Guide in 1978. She is now retired and lives in Bristol.