[letterhead of:
“IMPERIAL WAR GRAVES COMMISSION.
82, Baker Street,
LONDON, W.1.”]
14th March, 1924.
Madam,
With reference to your letter of recent date, enclosed in the forms you have returned to this office, I am directed to inform you that the question of the British graves in Germany has for some time past been receiving the earnest consideration of the Imperial War Graves Commission.
Some months ago several members of the Commission representing the United Kingdom and the Dominions went to Germany and visited the different cemeteries. The matter was discussed fully with the Commission’s staff on the spot, and they considered the various alternatives which had been suggested by their own staff and by the public generally.
The result of this very exhaustive enquiry has been to persuade the Commission that the best and probably the only way of ensuring the proper and permanent maintenance of these graves is by moving them into an exclusively British plot, (where it is possible to arrange this satisfactorily in existing Cemeteries) or to form an entirely new Cemetery. The graves will then be permanently cared for my British personnel whom the Commission will appoint.
I am now directed to inform you that in accordance with this decision the bodies of the British Soldiers buried in Dortmund Cemetery have been exhumed and re-buried in the South Cemetery, Cologne, Rhine Province.
The number of the grave in which the body of Private R.C. Gale has been put is 51[“51” has been crossed out and “71” penciled in below it], Row B. Plot 15.
I can assure you that the reburial has been carefully and reverently carried out.
I am to express regret that the report giving this information has apparently not reached you.
I am,
Madam,
Your obedient Servant.
[signature:][?]
for Principal Assistant Secretary.
Mrs. Gale,
Youngs Cove,
Queens Co.,
New Brunswick,
Canada.
[written in pencil at bottom: “111184 Private
R.C. Gale
4th Can Mounted Rifles
29th July 1918
Monument in cemetery
Their Name Liveth for Evermore”]
Original Scans
