"In the name of thousands"

Earlier this year when lockdown began, CWGC Assistant Archivist Michael Greet was forced to leave his usual duties and work remotely. One of the projects he’s been working on involved transcribing part of the petition led by Lady Florence Cecil appealing to the Prince of Wales to allow next-of-kin members to erect permanent headstones in the shape of a cross over the graves of their loved ones who were killed during the First World War.

Lady Cecil’s petition provides a sobering glimpse into the anguish of grieving family and friends after the war. It also tells us a lot about how and where people were living at the time, what emotions and experiences people were going through after the war and how important having their personal expression of love and loss was.

The First World War, sometimes described as “the war to end all wars”, is remembered as one of the deadliest conflicts in history for its devastating loss of life. For Lady Cecil and her husband Lord Rupert Ernest William Gascoyne-Cecil the Bishop of Exeter, the human cost was something they had experienced personally as they had lost three of their four sons in the course of the conflict.

Left: Lieutenant Rupert Edward Gascoyne-Cecil (The War Illustrated 7 August 1918), Right: Lieutenant Randle William Gascoyne-Cecil

Lieutenant Rupert Edward Gascoyne-Cecil was killed in action on 11 July 1915 near Ypres, Belgium. He is buried in Railway Dugouts Burial Ground (Transport Farm).

Lieutenant Randle William Gascoyne-Cecil  was killed in action at Masnieres, France on 1 December 1917 and is commemorated on the Cambrai Memorial, Louverval, France. He had been previously wounded three times in the war and his widow Elizabeth gave birth to their daughter Anne Mary seven months after his death.

Captain John Arthur Gascoyne-Cecil MC died on 27 August 1918 and was buried at Bucquoy Road Cemetery, Ficheux, France. He was posthumously awarded the Military Cross.

When the Imperial War Graves Commission (IWGC) was established in May 1917, work began to develop and implement the Commission’s approach in commemorating those who had fallen during the war. Leading architects and artists were enlisted to offer their advice for the design of war cemeteries and memorials to the missing.

In 1918, Sir Frederic Kenyon, the Commission’s Artistic Advisor, outlined the IWGC’s artistic vision in a report entitled ‘War Graves How The Cemeteries Abroad Will Be Designed’. Kenyon’s report formally stated the Commission’s intents, principles and purposes, including the erection of headstones of uniform shape and size over the graves. Then, in 1919, Rudyard Kipling’s booklet ‘The Graves of the Fallen’ helped explain the Commission’s key features to the public, providing illustrations of how the cemeteries would appear when completed. It also addressed the question of cruciform headstones and why the Commission had decided against using them:

"Stone crosses to succeed the temporary wooden crosses were at first suggested, but crosses of the small size necessitated by the nearness of the graves to each other do not allow sufficient space for the men’s names and the inscriptions, and are also by their shape too fragile and too subject to the action of frost and weather for enduring use."

‘The Graves of the Fallen’, p. 6

The Commission set forth a vision of lasting remembrance which was founded on a basis of practicality and equality of treatment. However, there was an inflammation of public opinion towards many of the Commission’s ideals and opposition began to rally against the Commission, especially from parents and partners who resented what they perceived as state-controlled bureaucracy at the expense of their decision for how and where their loved ones were to be remembered.

One of the earliest movements opposing the Commission’s approach was a petition organised by Sarah Smith who wanted to reverse the decision to not allow the repatriation of war graves. Mrs Smith’s petition led to the formation of the British War Graves Association which enlisted the aid of many powerful aristocratic women, including Lady Florence Cecil, who became Vice-President of the Association and was involved with many of its activities.

In 1919, Lady Cecil launched her own petition which became the opposing voice of many widows, mothers and fathers, brothers and sisters and others who wanted a cruciform headstone to be erected over their loved one’s graves rather than the Commission’s uniform headstone. In the covering letter addressed to the Prince of Wales, Lady Cecil expressed the comfort that she and her co-signatories felt through the symbolism of the Cross:  

‘It is only through the hope of the Cross that most of us are able to carry on the life from which all the sunshine seems to have gone, and to deny us the emblem of that strength and hope adds heavily to the burden of our sorrow.’  

The petition was contained within a large book adorned with the heraldic badge of the Prince of Wales - three white ostrich feathers emerging from a gold coronet. Collected among the pages of the petition book are some 8,000 handwritten signatures each with their own unique style, character and a family’s story of loss and sorrow to tell.

Some of their signatures are fairly straightforward, bearing the name of the signatory followed by their address and the relationship to their lost loved ones. Others are more personalised, revealing more about the tragic circumstances surrounding the death of their loved ones and the impact this had on those left behind after the war.

Ethelle Beatrice Polson wrote of her only son Lieutenant Geoffrey Polson who ‘fell in action on the eve of his 24th birthday’:

Elizabeth H. Russell-Davies recalled the loss of her only son Private Lewis George Russell-Davies who was ‘killed in his dugout during a tremendous bombardment by the enemy’. She reveals that her husband died of grief a mere six weeks later:

Isabel C. Dolby of Southsea requested to retain the monument erected over her son’s grave by his comrades in Philosophe British Cemetery after he was killed by a sniper on 7 May 1917.

Julia Newton noted that the photograph of her son’s grave marked with a cross ‘is very dear to me’.

Men and women from all walks of life signed the petition, from Scottish lairds to Wiltshire priests. Among the signatures is that of the Bishop of Saint Edmondsbury and Ipswich Henry Bernard Hodgson. He was the father of William Noel Hodgson, one of the war poets who authored ‘Verse and Prose in Peace and War’.

Some signatories appear to have signed the petition on more than one occasion as in the case of Reverend William Caldwell who lost his only child Lieutenant Gavin Ralston Mure on 9 October 1918.

It is difficult to comprehend the scale of loss divulged in the pages of the petition, which ranges from the loss of a beloved husband or an only child to a number of members of the same family, some killed within mere months of each other. Mr and Mrs Savage of Willesden Green, London lost their second son in July 1917, only to lose their eldest son two months later in September 1917.

There is also a sense of the impact of the First World War and its aftermath across towns, cities and villages in Britain and Ireland. Entire pages of the petition can be found signed by people all originating from the same locality, some even from the same street. For example, across the whole of the page below are the names and details of signatories all from Irvine in Ayrshire, Scotland.

Although the Commission did not concede to the wishes of those expressed in Lady Cecil’s petition, it was receptive to these kinds of requests and demonstrated sympathetic consideration of the countless letters and other communications it received from bereaved family members of casualties. There was a discussion about cruciform headstones at the Commission’s 15th meeting on 1 October 1919 when a specimen cruciform headstone design submitted by Lord Balfour was presented.

Lady Cecil’s petition and many other items from the Commission’s archive reveal some of the controversy and difficulties facing the Commission in its early history as well as some of the factors that influenced its approach to commemoration, such as the addition of a religious symbol and a personal inscription chosen by the next-of-kin to the headstone. From analysing the data collected during the transcription process, it is clear that many of the signatories later accepted the Commission’s offer to add a personal inscription to the bottom of the headstone and one can see how this may have provided some conciliation to the bereaved.

This has been a very insightful experience in understanding the impact of the war on families who had lost loved ones and the opposition which appeared towards the Commission.

There is a lot of information in the petition that will be useful for people interested in family history and the First World War, including some information that may not be available elsewhere. The petition in its entirety as well as many other digitised items from the collection can be accessed via the CWGC’s online archive catalogue.