An April Fool joke gone viral has rattled the cages of a few French genealogists. As explained on the FranceGenWeb blog, the blogger of Fromageplus posted (two years ago, mind you, which is a long time for anything to go viral) that the government had decided to remove the thousands of monuments aux morts, which commemorate those who died in World War I. Some of the reasons given were that the French no longer liked the monuments, that the monuments were a blot on the current France-Germany friendship and that new citizens did not understand them. The announcement was attributed to the government's anti-discrimination office, HALDE.
The monuments are everywhere. The one at the top is in the Paris Métro station of Strasbourg-Saint-Denis and lists all of the employees who died during the Great War. (We have uploaded a very large image for you to click on and read all of the names.) Many of them are in the art déco style and are quite striking. Many others, like the one above, are simple steles in villages and towns throughout the country. All are quite beloved, in fact, and it is unlikely that they will be removed any time soon, certainly not before the 100th anniversary of the war, coming up in 2014 to 2018. The folks at HALDE finally published a rather strange refutation that goes on to ramble about military pensions.
Whether in reaction to this false report or to challenge France's law forbidding photography in cemeteries or for their own cheerful reasons, the team at Geneanet have launched a collaborative programme urging users to upload photographs of all monuments, with lists of the names. They have named this category Monuments commémoratifs and they have, to date, a little over six thousand images of monuments and graves.
As a way to search for France's war dead, the Ministry of Defense's Mémoire des Hommes website is much better, for it is complete and will show the death record of the person. However, to then be able to see the monument in the home town or place of work of the person, via Geneanet's new service, is a nice little illustrative addition to online resources.
©2011 Anne Morddel
French Genealogy
Monsieur C,
This is a most welcome addition and comment. Thank you!
Posted by: Anne | 12 October 2011 at 18:14
As you noted in your fine post, the site « Mémoire des Hommes » holds records of the nearly 1.7 million soldiers who died for France in World War I (1914-18), as well as those who died in the Franco-Prussian War (1870-71), WWII (1939-45), Indochina (1946-54), Tunisia (1952-56), Ifni (Morocco, 1957-58), and Algeria (1954-62).
The SGA's complementary site, called « Sépultures de Guerre », holds the database of where those France military men are buried -- at both national military cemeteries (nécropoles nationales), and at military blocks of graves at commune cemeteries. This terrific resource should not be overlooked by anyone seeking to locate the exact final resting place of their French soldier.
The website of the SGA/Sépultures de Guerre may be found here:
http://www.sepulturesdeguerre.sga.defense.gouv.fr/
Those seeking additional information may benefit by writing directly to the French Ministry of Defense: Ministère de la Défense, Secrétariat d'État à la défense chargé des anciens combattants, at: 37, rue de Bellechasse, 75700 PARIS 07 SP. The Ministry has been most generous to me, sending attractive colour brochures of the national cemeteries where my relatives are buried along with Xerox copies of maps highlighting the locations of their graves.
Bonnes recherches !
Posted by: Monsieur C. | 30 September 2011 at 08:04