The Great War: Dealing with The Dead

- William E. Lutz, for The Great War

Perhaps the greatest telling legacy of the Great War are the dead.
Death during the Great War came in many ways. Death by exploding into a bloody mist while
serving on a battle cruiser blown up at Jutland. Death by being burned alive from a
flamethrower. Death by artillery barrage or the merciless slice of machine gun bullets. Death by
slow suffocation from a gas attack, or of being badly wounded and slowly drowning in mud, or of
being buried alive in a collapsing trench bunker.
No other war up to this point in history had mass slaughter been so scientifically researched,
developed and conducted, except perhaps that of the American Civil War, where toward the end
of that conflict, many of the tactics and practices later used by the armies in the Great War were
expanded upon. The phenomenon of Missing In Action (MIA) and the number of unknown
bodies became particularly notable during the Great War, where the mechanized nature of
modern warfare meant that a single battle could cause an astounding numbers of casualties.
For example, in 1916 over 300,000 Allied and German combatants were killed in the Battle of
the Somme alone. And, as with many other aspects of the developing nature of modern war,
burial detail during the beginning of the Great War was anything up to standards that the new
warfare demanded.

The remains of a German soldier found in the

muddy fields of Passchendaele.

Before the Great War, soldiers killed in

combat were generally buried in communal
graves which were usually not marked
specifically as military burial sites, their
bodies buried and the gravesite forgotten.
Only specific leaders or famous heroes were
given the honor of a marked individual war
grave; otherwise, the common soldiers were
simply interred in mass graves, a prayer or sermon given and then later forgotten, their location
lost forever.
It was later on in some of the 19th century battles - namely the Mexico-American War
(1847-1850), the Crimean War at Sebastopol (1856) and Solferino (1859) and the FrancoPrussian War (1870-71), soldiers were buried in marked military burial sites, with a cemetery
marker denoting their location; the remains of the individual soldiers in these sites were not,
however, separated into individual graves and often were mixed together. The idea of bringing
fallen troops home is a relatively modern idea which come into being not until the late 19th
century; prior to this, military authorities did little to differentiate and identify dead troops.

Page 1

The modern system for cataloguing and burying military dead has its roots in part beginning
during the American Civil War, when the enormity of the carnage triggered a wholesale
revolution in how the government treated fallen troops. The Federal Congress decided that the
defenders of the Union were worthy of special burial sites for their sacrifices, and set up a
program of national cemeteries (Arlington and Gettysburg Cemeteries, for example). During the
war, more than 300,000 dead Union soldiers were buried in small cemeteries scattered across
the United States. When the fighting stopped, military authorities launched an ambitious effort to
collect the remains and rebury them in the newly created national cemeteries.

A Bulgarian Army burial detail at work.

The American armed forces expanded this

concept one step further. Following the Spanish
-American War in 1898 and the Philippine American war during 1898 to 1900, the
American military recalled former veterans of the
American Civil War whose experience with
grave registration proved invaluable. From this
experience and owing to the recent international
conflict with Spain, the U.S. military expanded
the notion of identification and registration of the
dead, enabling families to request that their loved ones be given the opportunity to be returned
home back to the United States; this experience would be put to good use by American burial
forces during the Great War.
Meanwhile in Europe, in the early weeks of the Great War, the fighting forces of both sides had
no official register to whom these battlefield burials could be formally reported with a name and
the location of graves. Those fortunate soldiers who reached a hospital in a safe area behind
the fighting lines and who died of their wounds would usually be buried in a cemetery near to
the hospital. Often, it would be in an existing town or village cemetery or in a specially created
annexed burial plot; the idea being that these burials could be registered and their locations
then marked for future retrieval. But this approach was not practical for the amount of dead that
were coming in.
The large numbers of dead also confronted the warring nations with the question of what the
authorities should do about registering burials. The families who had lost a loved one would
naturally expect that a record of the soldier's grave would be kept for pilgrimage visits or for the
body's repatriation. As a result, real comprehensive official war graves registration services in
Europe were established by many of the fighting nations after 1914 when the war had started.
Surprisingly, many of the practices now associated with burial services were not truly utilized
fully until during or after The Great War; take, for example, dog tags. Dog tags were a relatively
new invention. During the 1800s, European and American soldiers would often write their
names on pieces of paper and attach it to their clothes or in tin boxes in the hopes of being

Page 2

identified should they be killed. Historically, it was China, however, who developed dog tags as a
modern tool. During the Taiping Rebellion in China (1856 to 1861) soldiers on both sides wore
dog tags in the form of pieces of wood on their belt bearing the soldier's name, age, birthplace,
unit, and date of enlistment.
But it wasnt until the latter half of the 1800s / early beginning of the 20th century that dog tags
became more common. In 1907 the British Army introduced identity discs in place of identity
cards in the form of pressed fiber material, typically made at individual regimental depots using
machines similar to those common at public fairs, the soldiers particulars being pressed on one
letter at a time and then given to the soldier as their proof of identity; naturally, fiber did not last
as long as metal tags, which were eventually issued later on.
The Great War offered serious challenges which were often beyond the means of what limited
burial registration services existed at the time. Much of the dead in the Great War were often
lost simply due to battlefield conditions. Soldiers died in collapsed underground tunneling owing
to artillery barrages, killed in no mans land and left for days on end, often forgotten while
conditions in the landscape - such as heavy, prolonged rain - turned the landscape into a sea of
mud burying the remains. Accounts by soldiers during the 1917 Battle of Passchendaele at
Ypres tell of men literally drowning and disappearing in the waterlogged shell craters and deep
mud, their bodies simply sunk too deeply or in conditions that they were not able to be retrieved,
their locations lost and soon forgotten. Additionally, weapons developments frequently caused
such dreadful bodily damage that it was not possible to identify or even find a complete body for
burial. And graves and burial grounds situated in the area of a battlefront were often damaged
by subsequent fighting across the same location, resulting in the loss of the original marked
graves, with wooden crosses falling down, and grave sites lost owing to not being adequately
marked as to their location.

Typical front line graveyards

were rudimentary affairs, with
the dead often buried close to
the trenches. Soldiers told of
hearing the rats eating the
dead between battle lulls,
while the stench of the dead
would often become prevalent
owing to the rain and
groundwater. In time, these
front line graves would
become destroyed and lost
owing to artillery fire or shifting
lines, with many of these sites
lost and/or forgotten.

These - and other factors - were generally responsible for the high number of missing
casualties on all sides and for the many thousands of graves for which the identity is described
as Unknown, leaving future burial details to recover and record what they could.

Page 3

Over time, specific military units were assigned the task of graves registration and burial details,
moving away from the traditional method of having soldiers who just fought in battle burying
their dead comrades. Officers often described the negative impact of using the same units in
burying the dead as had carried out the recent successful attack across it. Both the failure to
bury and the act of burying their dead comrades were therefore reasonably regarded as
potential morale problems, thus the move toward dedicated grave registration units came into
force.
Burial service was never an easy task, especially after many of the bodies often found would
have laid in their spaces for days, if not weeks - or longer - owing to the battle lines shifting or
efforts simply stalled owing to the battles raging on. You can imagine the horror burial
serviceman encountered.
As one young British soldier, a Private McCauley, on grave services recounted:
Often have I picked up the remains of a fine brave man on a shovel. Just a little heap of bones
and maggots to be carried to the common burial place. Numerous bodies were found lying
submerged in the water in shell holes and mine craters; bodies that seemed quite whole, but
which became like huge masses of white, slimy chalk when we handled them. I shuddered as
my hands, covered in soft flesh and slime, moved about in search of the disc, and I have had to
pull bodies to pieces in order that they should not be buried unknown. It was very painful to
have to bury the unknown.

Given the amount of carnage and the constant

barrage of gas attacks, artillery barrages,
occasional bombings and other forms of death, it
is a wonder that as many bodies as there were
found were able to be identified in the first place.

It was with the arrival of the Americans and their

prior experiences in the Spanish American War
that grave registration became a more
professional mission with the establishment of the
GRREG: Graves Registration Services. While the
headquarters of the Graves Registration Service
consolidated and preserved mortuary records and maintained cemeteries at the rear of the
battlefield, the GRREG companies actively supported the troops on the front line, with the
Americans introducing the application of dedicated grave registration units during active warfare
whose primary mission was the recovery and registration of the newly dead. The dedication and
espirit de corps of these soldiers, whose mission was to care for their dead comrades was
extraordinary. These men often took incredibly dangerous risks in their efforts to ensure proper
identification of fellow soldiers who had fallen. The American commander of U.S. forces during
the Great War, General Blackjack Pershing, wrote about one such unit in the spring of 1918:
They began their work under heavy shell fire and gas, and, although troops were in dugouts,
these men immediately went to the cemetery and in order to preserve records and locations,
repaired and erected new crosses as fast as the old ones were blown down. They also

Page 4

completed extension of the cemetery, this work occupying a period of one-and-a-half hours,
during which time shells were falling continuously and they were subject to mustard gas. They
gathered many bodies which at first had been in the hands of the Germans and were later
retaken by American counterattacks. Identification was especially difficult, all papers and tags
have been removed, and most of the bodies, being in terrible condition beyond recognition.

Another notion introduced by the GRREG to American armed forces was getting the relatives of
fallen U.S. servicemen to have the remains of their loved ones interned in the country where
they had died. Prior to this time, American families routinely sought their loved ones to be
brought home. Former U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt encouraged the alternative by
requesting that his son, Quentin, be buried near the ground where he was killed. Where the
tree falls, let it lie, were the poetic words Roosevelt used to convince grieving American
families.
Burial services also had their deep consequences on those who not only suffered the loss of a
loved one, but upon those who worked in finding and burying the dead. As one Reverend J.
Bickersteth described typical post-traumatic symptomatology in the men carrying out clearing: It
is piteous work this collecting of dead...after three or four days in the forward area too, it tries
the nerves and causes a curious kind of irritability which was quite infectious - all the party being
cross and out of temper, and it was quite easy to find oneself heatedly arguing some trivial point
for no apparent reason.
Another chaplain, Reverend D. Railton, a divisional chaplain noted: Many men who have stood
it all, cannot stand this clearing of the battlefield...no words can tell you all I feel, nor can words
tell you of the horrors of clearing a battlefield. This Battalion was left to do that, and several men
went off with shell-shock...caused not just by the explosion of a shell nearby, but by the sights
and smell and horror of the battlefield in general. I felt dreadful, and had to do my best to keep
the men up to the task.

Every year, more remains from World

War I are being found. In this instance,
a trench containing the body of 21
German soldiers were found. This
trench was discovered urging the
course of a car park being built in
Carspach, France, the bodies frozen
in time at the moment of their death
when a shell exploded above the
trench, burying the soldiers alive.
Modern technology now enables
genetic testing and extensive efforts
by authorities to seek out the
descendants of the dead to allow for
proper identification and notification.

Page 5

Generally, burial services during active service involved several processes. On discovering a
body with both tags (assuming that such tags could be found) the second tag could be taken to
record the death, the other tag remaining with the body for the benefit of burial parties who,
whenever possible, would prepare markers.
Body recovery and documentation was not an easy task. The sheer physical difficulties of the
work were significant. On the devastated battlefields much initial effort had to be directed into
erecting accommodation and providing supplies for those within the burial services. The
weather added to difficulties, as for example in the winter months following November 1918,
frost stopped burial work until warmer weather arrived in the coming months.
A typical burial team consisted of five to six men for each working day to exhume each body,
transport it to the cemetery and re-intern it. Exhumation companies comprised squads of 32
men. Each squad was supplied with two pairs of rubber gloves, two shovels, stakes to mark the
location of graves found, canvas and rope to tie up remains, stretchers, cresol (used as a
disinfectant) and wire cutters.
A stake was placed where remains were found. Experience was the only method of knowing
where to dig. Indeed, it was noted that unless previously experienced men are employed...80%
of the bodies which remain to be picked up would never be found." When searching for dead
bodies, indications of remains included:
i.

Rifles or stakes protruding from the ground, bearing helmets or equipment;

ii. Partial remains or equipment on the surface or protruding from the ground;
iii. Rat holes - often small bones or pieces of equipment would be brought to the surface by the
rats;
iv. Discoloration of grass, earth or water - grass was often a vivid bluish-green with broader
blades where bodies were buried, while earth and water turned a greenish black or grey color.

Global climate is also having a notable impact on

the remains of the Great War. Bodies of soldiers
thought forever lost in the mountains between
Italy and Austria are being rediscovered as the
ice melts; in this image we see the remains of two
Austrian teenage soldiers recently discovered by
hikers.

Page 6

When a body was found, the remains found were placed on cresol soaked canvas. For
identification purposes, a careful examination of pockets, the neck, wrists and braces for
identification tags was undertaken. A typical description of attempts to identify a late exhumation
might be as follows:
* Exhumed a grave found in a wood between St Marguerite and Missy. This grave contained an
unknown British soldier wearing boots made by UNITY CO-OP SOCY LTD RINGSTEAD 1913.
The remains were found in a swamp and had to be recovered from a foot of water. Nothing by
which the remains could be identified could be found.
* Another soldier was found at Tower Hamlets, Ypres in December 1921: Body reported by one
of a gang. This was not identified even partially, though very careful search was made, the boots
scraped and colored silk handkerchief examined. This was probably a 1914 soldier as date on
boots was 1914.

Dog tags were in

their infancy
during the Great
War. This photo
displays a
number of Dog
tags used by
various armies.
Note the quality
of the materials
used; the British
Army ID tags for
the Great War
were made of
pressed fiber: not
a very durable
material.

Despite the introduction and application of identity disks, post-battle burial identification was not
always successful. Corpses could usually only be identified by the accompanying effects, and
remains found with such were very much in the minority. In April 1920 it was noted by British
burial services that of corpses found with effects, 20% were identified by identity discs; 25%

Page 7

were confirmed by discs; 30% were identified by other methods; with 25% unidentifiable. A
name on a compass, a photograph case, a key tab, a spoon or a pipe bowl might reveal the
owners name. In areas where more intense fighting took place (and thus more bodies) - such as
Verdun - the emphasis on identification dropped. By May of 1921 most burial services were only
undertaking exhumations for identification "when they had the time" owing to the number of
remains. Overall, it was noted that with British burial services, although 600 bodies a week
were being recovered, identification was achieved in only 20% of cases - in effect, out of 600
bodies found, only 120 were able to be identified; the rest remained unknown.
Burial services during battle was challenging enough, but even after the war burial services did
not always go smoothly. Officers routinely complained of discipline issues and financial
irregularities. Units often companied about lack of materials - canvas or shovels, for example and transports
Discipline also became a problem with burial units, both due to lack of equipment and staffing
shortages, but also to the nature of the job itself. Units were rotated and new personnel brought
in to continue the work. It is notable that the described effects of burial services were emotional
in nature - depressed mood (and other post-traumatic symptomatology), which was both
marked and common. Not surprisingly, post-war exhumers were prone to behavioral
disturbance: drinking, insubordination, and rowdiness.
Given the reality of death during the Great War, counting the dead is far from an exact science;
but what figures remain are deeply disturbing. The end of the war left uncleared recent dead,
isolated graves, and a myriad of accidental inhumations. The German war graves agency, the
Volksbund Deutsche Kriegsgrber Frsorge (VDK) considers that there are still possibly
approximately 80,000 German soldiers who fell in action in Flanders alone and whose remains
cannot be accounted for. The percentage of
unknown U.S. Army remains was around
three per 100 bodies recovered, with the
figure reading as high as 3,000 unaccounted
for American soldiers.

The logistical challenges for grave

registrations facing any army during the
Great War were substantial, not to mention
traumatic. Imagine, for example, having the
task of going into a half-collapsed bunker to
pull out the dead, as in this picture?

Page 8

Owing to conditions and the circumstances, barely half of the Western Fronts dead had been
given aproper burial indesignated military cemeterieswhen the Armistice ended the First World
War in November 1918.
For Great Britain, across all theaters of war some 94,000 graves were registered and over
57,000 unverified burials recorded - that is, if bodies could be found. British authorities believe
that over 165,000 bodies still cannot be accounted for. French authorities cannot account for
nearly 360,000 soldiers. Overall, for the Entente the total MIA at the end of the war stands
(conservatively) roughly half a million; this figure is conservative as many records - what few
that were made - within the Russian Imperial Army were evidently lost in the years following the
Revolution (it should be noted that Russian figures are, at best, estimates as many records
were either lost during the Revolution or owing to attitudes held by the new regime toward
imperialistic actions were deliberately ignored and/or destroyed).
The German Imperial army has estimates of nearly 200,000 unaccounted for. The AustriaHungarian empire alone is estimated to have nearly 800,000 missing and unaccounted for while
Italy has no exact figures for their missing and unaccounted for. These figures are not out of line
when you consider that during the Battle of Verdun approximately 230,000 men died out of a
total of 700,000 casualties (dead, wounded and missing). The Douaumont Ossuary alone holds
the skeletal remains of at least 130,000 unidentified combatants of both France and Germany.
Taken into consideration the total combatants on both sides and their estimates of those missing
or unknown dead, over 1,000,000 bodies are not accounted for (and these figures do not
include civilian losses).
Somewhere out there are nearly 1,000,000 bodies of soldiers with no name, with no proper
burial and are yet - if ever - to be found; the true legacy of the Great War.
After the Great War, battlefields were cleared of equipment, ammunition and debris. Known
burial sites were examined and many burials in small cemeteries or individual graves were
moved to larger dedicated cemeteries. Some burial sites were left to a nation in perpetuity in
gratitude for the sacrifice of these individuals.
The problem of grave registration for World War I soldiers
was furthermore complicated with the coming of the Second
World War. Many of the First World War cemeteries had still
not been renovated before 1939 and following the Second
World War, there were more war dead to register, bury and
care for, further complicating burial efforts. And for Germany
and Russia, many records regarding the dead for the Great
War were lost owing to the devastation of World War II.
The dead from the Great War have remained undiscovered
for nearly 100 years since they fell in battle, with bodies
constantly discovered by the construction of roads and
houses. Some bodies have been found by chance in the
undergrowth in remote places, or in the farm fields where
miles of trenches stretched, bodies trapped in underground
collapsed bunkers or simply left in the fields that were once

Page 9

filled with endless mounds of mud. Even today, the remains of as many as 20or 30(or more)
Great War soldiers can be found on the old Western Front each year while more are being
found in locations worldwide, stretching from the Italian alps, the deserts of Arabia, the empty
reaches of the Ukraine or the lost wrecks sunk in the oceans of the world.
The Great War still lives on in the memories of the dead - both properly buried and the
multitudes still lost and unaccounted for. There are a number of Great War cemeteries; to learn
more where they can be found, go to this website: http://www.greatwar.co.uk/war-graves/ww1war-graves.htm

References
http://jonestown.sdsu.edu/?page_id=62722
http://www.greatwar.co.uk/war-graves/ww1-war-graves.htm
http://www.vlib.us/wwi/resources/clearingthedead.html
http://www.centenarynews.com/article?id=2793
http://encyclopedia.1914-1918-online.net/article/
commemoration_cult_of_the_fallen_russian_empire
http://www.greatwar.co.uk/research/military-records/ww1-war-dead-records.htm10
http://s464.photobucket.com/user/AGustafB/media/brs029.jpg.html
http://www.firstworldwar.com/features/casualties.htm

Page 10