A Canadian soldier salutes the casket of the unknown Newfoundland WWI soldier before it is loaded on a plane bound for St. John's, at Lille airport in France, on May 25.Rafael Yaghobzadeh/The Globe and Mail
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He died somewhere on the muddy fields of northern France in 1916, when some of the bloodiest battles of the First World War took place and hundreds of thousands of men and women lost their lives.
He’s been lying in a cemetery near Beaumont-Hamel for more than a century, one of many whose graves are marked simply “Known only unto God.” All that’s known about him for certain: He was from Newfoundland.
On Saturday, the soldier finally began his journey home.
A casket carrying his remains was handed over by six French soldiers during a solemn ceremony at the Beaumont-Hamel Newfoundland Memorial. A group of Canadian soldiers received the casket, draped it in a Canadian flag and took it to a waiting hearse. An honour guard of soldiers from both countries lined the walkway in silence while a bagpiper played.
Dozens of veterans and officials from the Canadian, French and Newfoundland governments took part in the ceremony, which also included poetry readings, prayers and both national anthems.
The hearse made its way to the airport in Lille where the casket was loaded onto a plane bound for St. John’s. On July 1, it will be interred in a new tomb for unknown Newfoundland soldiers who died during both world wars when the province was a dominion of the British Empire.
Around 12,000 Newfoundlanders signed up to fight after Britain declared war in August, 1914. That represented just over one-third of the dominion’s population of young men at the time. Nearly 3,600 died or were wounded during the Great War, including 800 who fell in the first 30 minutes of the Battle of the Somme on July 1, 1916, which took place near Beaumont-Hamel.
The ceremony “was incredibly moving,” said Newfoundland and Labrador Premier Andrew Furey. “I broke down several times. It’s a truly special and historic moment for all of Newfoundland and Labrador.”
Colleen Burger, who lives in Moncton, came to Saturday’s ceremony to see her son, who was part of the Canadian honour guard. She’d only recently learned about the Newfoundland Regiment and the losses it suffered.
“I wasn’t expecting to be this emotional,” she said after the ceremony. She added that as the mother of two sons in the military, she was moved to tears at the sight of the casket and the agony that soldier’s mother would have experienced waiting for word about her son.
“It just makes me so grateful that I can reach out to my son at any time and get to hear him,” she said. “So, to that mom, her boy is finally going home.”
Danny Neil and his wife, Rachael, who live outside Calgary, also came to see their son, who sang Ode to Newfoundland during the ceremony. Mr. Neil’s grandfather’s brother, Ralph Neil, is among the dozens of names on a plaque at the memorial that’s dedicated to Newfoundland soldiers who died in 1916 and whose bodies were never recovered. Ralph was just 23 when he died, roughly the same age as Mr. Neil’s son.
“You drive through here and it’s a beautiful day. And you imagine, 100-something years ago, young Canadians coming over here. It’s very powerful,” said Mr. Neil, who is originally from Newfoundland.
After the ceremony, Seamus O’Regan, the Minister of Labour and Seniors, who is from St. John’s, had to pause and collect himself before speaking about what it meant. He found out years ago that one of his uncles died here during the war and is buried in a cemetery by the memorial.
“It’s touching his headstone and making that connection,” Mr. O’Regan said. Referring to the casket he added: “This son of ours is going to our National War Memorial so that people can have that feeling of knowing that one of theirs is there, and to feel the headstone to make that connection.”
Several people from the town of Beaumont-Hamel attended the service. “It was very moving,” said the town’s mayor, Agnes Briet-Lavaquerie. She added that the ceremony helps strengthen the ties between France and Newfoundland and bring more understanding about the war.
“Our role is to tell the story, so the younger generation knows what happened here, because it is so important,” she said. “We will never forget because the sacrifice was enormous.”