Horrors of war remembered
Posted by Sane Spirit on Tuesday, December 25, 2012
Under: In the News
The tomb, poignant and grisly, sheds light on the lives of the soldiers who died in explosions from heavy shells that penetrated the tunnel.
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The roof of the "Killian Shelter," a tunnel 125 meters (410 feet) long near the small town of Carspach in the Alsace region, was discovered by chance in October 2010 during excavation work for a nearby road building project. The regional French archaeological authority, PAIR, began a thorough dig last month and expects to complete its work by mid-November.
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Boots, helmets and weapons, a wine bottle and a mustard jar have been found along with personal items including dog tags, wallets, pipes, cigarette cases, spectacles and pocket books. A rosary was also found, with a French bullet threaded in among the prayer beads, evidently fashioned as a souvenir.
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In Germany, it's a very different story. The find has only made the inside pages of a handful of newspapers. In the nation's memory, the war is eclipsed by World War II, the Holocaust and the collective guilt that weighs on Germany to this day. Both conflicts have imbued Germany with a deep streak of pacifism. "Britain, France and Belgium still refer to it as the Great War, but our memory of it is totally buried by World War II with the Holocaust, the expulsion from the east, the Allied bombardment," Fritz Kirchmeier, spokesman for the German War Graves Commission, told SPIEGEL ONLINE. "World War I plays only a minor role in the German national memory."
WWI Grave Find Tells Story Germans Want To Forget
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The roof of the "Killian Shelter," a tunnel 125 meters (410 feet) long near the small town of Carspach in the Alsace region, was discovered by chance in October 2010 during excavation work for a nearby road building project. The regional French archaeological authority, PAIR, began a thorough dig last month and expects to complete its work by mid-November.
[,,,]
Boots, helmets and weapons, a wine bottle and a mustard jar have been found along with personal items including dog tags, wallets, pipes, cigarette cases, spectacles and pocket books. A rosary was also found, with a French bullet threaded in among the prayer beads, evidently fashioned as a souvenir.
[,,,]
In Germany, it's a very different story. The find has only made the inside pages of a handful of newspapers. In the nation's memory, the war is eclipsed by World War II, the Holocaust and the collective guilt that weighs on Germany to this day. Both conflicts have imbued Germany with a deep streak of pacifism. "Britain, France and Belgium still refer to it as the Great War, but our memory of it is totally buried by World War II with the Holocaust, the expulsion from the east, the Allied bombardment," Fritz Kirchmeier, spokesman for the German War Graves Commission, told SPIEGEL ONLINE. "World War I plays only a minor role in the German national memory."
WWI Grave Find Tells Story Germans Want To Forget
In : In the News