OUR SOLDIERS GRAVES

Dominion, Volume 9, Issue 2879, 18 September 1916, Page 3

OUR SOLDIERS GRAVES

IN FRANCE WORK OF GRAVES REGISTRATION COMMISSION The Minister of Defence (Colonel J'ames Allen) has received through official sources valuable and eagerlyawaited information as to precisely what is beinjj done to mark tho graves of New Zealand soldiers who fall at the front. This work is being carefully attended- to, it seems, _by tho Graves Registration Commission; how carefully is sot out in a letter received from Captain E. L. Hindley, of the New Zealand Records Section in France, which roads as follows: —' •> "Tho Graves Registration. Commission is a military organisation, acting directly under the Adjutant-General, G.H.Q. It is composed of an officoat G.H.Q. and three branch offices in different parts of the line. Working from these branches are mobile, section!*, consisting of 0110 or two officers with a clerk each, motor-cars, and motorcycles. These officers are constantly travelling about, and select suitablo places in their own scction for cemeteries, and arrange with .the French authorities for their use and lescrvation. Tho cemeteries (of which there are scores) are generally about two or tlireo miles behind the front lino, and every effort is made to bury all the doad in one of them. When the burial is to take placo, tiie Graves Registration Officer is informed, and he proceeds to tho cemetery, taking with him a sufficient number of wooden crosses. The name, rank, regimental number, and unit of tho person to be Juried is then stamped on aluminum tape and nailed to the cross, which is then erected in concrete over tho grave. These crosses are, therefore, quite durablo enough to idontify the grave until after the war, when permanent memorials can be erected. A 'report is then mado to the 3rd Echolon, G.H.Q., of all persons buried. This report is extracted; and lists are sent to each record section for verification. After the record section has recorded tho •nformation the list is returned to the_ 3rd Echelon with any inaccuracies plainly marked. The 3rd Echelon advises tho Graves Registration Commission, who alter tho inscriptions on the graves. The 3rd Echelon keeps an alphabetical index for all persons buried so that it is possible' to find at once tlio grave of any person from the name no matter to what force he may belong. "I understand that all tho graves at .the Dardanelles, Egypt, Mesopotamia, etc., now come under this administration,' and that it is tho intcnion to form at the end of the war an imperial Committee to permanently mark tho' graves, tend to cemetrries,etc. In a good many eases the cemeteries arc not yet numbered off, and this will not be done until It-ter. It is, therefore, impossible to get the number, etc., of each grave at present, but as they are all plainly marked this is not a matter of great moment."