DESERT WAR CEMETERIES ARE CONFORMING TO PATTERN

Wanganui Chronicle, 11 May 1948, Page 5

DESERT WAR CEMETERIES ARE CONFORMING TO PATTERN

Graves Of New Zealanders At Solium, Acroma, Alamein

(From E. G. Webber, Special N.Z.P.A. Correspondent) Received 6.40 p.m. CAIRO, May 10 As they have been planned by the Imperial War Graves Commission, the desert cemeteries will be laid out to pattern conforming to features of the countryside in which they are situated.

This pattern can at present best be discerned at Solium, where the cemetery is now practically completed.

At Solium the plots are surrounded by a handsome low stone wall, built of faintly rose-coloured stone which is quarried only a mile or two away from the cemetery. The main entrance Is flanked on either side by domed entrance gate houses, surmounted by models of the Imperial Crown.

The outer wall Is broken by recessed arched stone shelters, where visitors may sit, and opposite the gateway, set into the far wall, as a stone loggia on which roses and otser climbing plants already are being trained. Tnis loggia forms the framework for the "War Stone,” common to all British war cemeteries, and which bears only a simple inscription: “Their Names Llveth for Evermore.” In the centre of the plots, midway between the entrance gateway and the war stone is the tall white Cross of Remembrance—at present qonstrucied of wood, hut later to be .built. permanently in stone. On the other side of the entrance gateway, crouching beside domed roofs of tin gate houses, are the sculptured figures of a lioness and her cub, symbolic of Britain and her Commonwealth. In arid desert soil it Is not possible to develop lawns and flower gardens on the lines followed so successfully on Gallipoli and in Europe, but bright patches of desert "pink faces,” and other native flowers suitable to the soil, already are in bloom. The problem of developing a water supply, which will enable this feature of the cemetery to be extended, is one for the future. The Solium cemetery lies below the Halfaya escarpment on the flats just outside the battered settlement, and lacing the blue waters of Solium Bay. It contains the graves of 1300 men of the United Kingdom, 365 South Africans, 1980 New Zealanders and Australians and 11 Canadians. It is the resting place not only of those who fell in the battle for the escarpment above Solium, but in the nghting for Halfaya Pass, Sidi Barvanl and Bardia.

ACROMA AND EL ALAMEIN. The general pattern of Solium cemetery, adapted to local topography, will be followed at Acroma and El Alamein, the two larger desert cemeteries to the west and east of Solium. At Acroma, work on the permanent construction of the cemetery is well forward, and if sufficient labour is available may be completed in two months' time. The cemetery lies on the Tobruk bypass road, close to its junction with the main Tobruk road and just below the escarpment. It contains the graves of 2059 me;; of United Kingdom units, 485 New Zealanders, 355 South Africans and 253 Australians, the bulk of whom fell in the fighting round Acroma, Knightsbridge, Sidi Ressgh, El Adam and in breaking the siege of Tobruk. When it Is completed the cemetery will rise in terraces towards the escarpment and the Memorial Cross will be placed so that its top will stand clearly silhouetted over the top of the ridge. At El Alamein, where 3164 men ot British and British Commonwealth forces are buried, most of the permanent work on the walls and memorials has still to be done. So far, the work has been concentrated upon the permanent construction and formation of plots. A temporary concrete and mudbrick wall, erected on one section on -the cemetery boundary, has been demolished and piles ot stone, ready cut from a nearby quarry, lie around the boundaries ready for wall and shelters. Here, as at Acroma and Solium, plots, without exception, are neat and well tended. Some rearrangement has been carried out since the New Zealand memorial service was held at Alamein at the end of the war, and the majority of the 1079 New Zealand graves In the cemetery are now concentrated into three main plots. When it is completed the Alamein cemetery will be approached by a wide roadway from the main Alexandria road and will probably have central memorials to the missing in the Desert campaigns. A "War Stone” will be erected in the centre of the cemetery, where a flagstaff now stands, and the White Cross of Remembrance will be so placed that it will stand out clear cut against the low horizon to the south.