97-Year-Old WWI ‘Sacred Soil’ Marker at Arlington Gets Full Restoration

The 250th birthday of the United States is also a reflection of the nation’s global diplomacy, notably its long and friendly relationship with ally France. Both are coming together this weekend to honor American veterans.

At 11 a.m. ET this Sunday, July 5, at Arlington National Cemetery representatives from both nations, including U.S. Gold Star Mothers who have lost children in recent conflicts, will mark 250 years of shared commitment to liberty by dedicating a restored World War I monument. Gold Star Mothers will place into the memorial “sacred soil” they gathered this past May from French and Belgian World War I battlefields.

The original marker was created in 1929 by French artist and WWI veteran Gaston Beblaize and gifted by French veterans in memory of the Americans who fought and died to defend France during “The War to End All Wars.” Beblaize’s first designed marker—a small ceramic piece of modest dimensions (13x5x3.5 cm)—was inspired by mileage stones he and his comrades reportedly encountered while marching along the roads.

An Associated Press imaged published March 22, 1929, in the Washington Post shows soil from French battlefields being deposited at Arlington Cemetery. (AP/Washington Post/AMBC/US Embassy)

The ceremony will include Gold Star Mothers from Virginia, New Mexico, California, Kansas and New York, as well as representatives from the American Battle Monuments Commission (ABMC), American Battle Monuments Foundation, Army National Military Cemeteries, United War Veterans Council, Souvenir Francais USA, the Friends of Renée and Gaston Deblaize, and the French Embassy.

“The American Battle Monuments Commission is honored to be a part of restoring this marker, originally placed at Arlington National Cemetery by the French in honor of America’s World War I fallen,” Robert Dalessandro, acting secretary of the ABMC, told Military.com. “It was born from remembrance. It carried within it soil from battlefields where American service members fought, sacrificed and died on French ground.

“It was a gesture from France to the United States: a recognition that the earth of those battlefields had become sacred because of the lives given there.”

From May 10 to 17, Gold Star Mothers were matched with a service member whose mother couldn’t participate in the original pilgrimage, marking the first time in more than 100 years they had been visited by a mom. The mothers, according to the AMBC, “introduced” their children to the fallen WWI service members.

“The grief and sacrifice of these mothers are identifiable human intangibles,” Eric McKenzie, superintendent at Flanders Field American Cemetery, said in a statement in May. “Their presence today at our site is relevant to anyone who witnesses their stories.”

Read the entire article on the Military.com website.
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