A visit to The National Memorial Arboretum (NMA) in Alrewas, Staffordshire sounds like the kind of trip you would make out of a sense of duty rather than by choice. But, on the contrary, the NMA offers such a unique and positive experience that I would thoroughly recommend it to anyone travelling in the English Midlands.
Its location in the heart of Britain and easy travel links makes it a place that is very accessible to visitors from anywhere in the UK. My mother lives in nearby Lichfield, less than half an hour’s drive away; otherwise I’m not sure I would have gone.
In general, I associate war memorials or remembrance day parades with formal displays of pomp and pageantry which merely serve to celebrate military services. They make me think of Eric Bogle‘s memorable song ‘And The Band Played Waltzing Matilda’ about the Battle of Gallipoli in which he vividly describes the “mad world of blood, death and fire” and which includes this memorable verse which always brings a lump to my throat:
“But the band played Waltzing Matilda, as they carried us down the gangway.
But nobody cheered, they just stood and stared, then they turned all their faces away
And so now every April, I sit on me porch, and I watch the parades pass before me.
And I see my old comrades, how proudly they march, reviving old dreams of past glories
And the old men march slowly, old bones stiff and sore. They’re tired old heroes from a forgotten war
And the young people ask, what are they marching for? And I ask myself the same question”.
Remembering forgotten wars in a more positive manner is one of the main purposes of the NMA. It consists of a large site of 150 acres of trees and memorials. Trees and plants are carefully selected for their symbolism. For example, a plot for The Indian Army and Royal Indian Navy consists of trees native to the Himalayas and Southern Asia.
This attention to detail also extends to the design of individual plots. The Gallipoli monument includes a tree sculpture of dead oak trees, arranged to represent the arms and hands of injured soldiers desperately reaching upwards as they lay in the mud with the dead or dying.
The centrepiece of the site is the Armed Services Memorial designed by Liam O’Connor Architect‘s where the names of the dead are recorded in date and service order on huge Portland stone panels. The blank walls are a poignant reminder that more names are going to be added. A space has been left between the panels, a detail explained by the following carved inscription : “through this space a shaft of light falls at the eleventh hour on the eleventh day of the eleventh month”.
Two moving bronze sculptures created by Ian Rank-Broadley depict scenes of the living carrying away the dead from a field of battle. On one side is an evocative depiction of a grieving mother and child.
Not all the memorials are devoted to death in conflict. A Stillbirth and Neonatal Death Society (SANDS) Garden was set up by bereaved parents after experiencing “a complete lack of acknowledgement and understanding and impact of their loss”.
Another notable plot is dedicated to those who died on 9/11, a sharp reminder that the notion of war victims must now extend those killed in terrorist atrocities .
Unfortunately, on my short visit I did not have time to visit a plot called Shot At Dawn. This is in the most easterly point of the Arboretum so is the first place to be touched by the dawn light.
This plot is in remembrance of 306 British and Commonwealth soldiers shot for desertion or cowardice during the First World War. Most were sentenced to death after a short trial where there was no real opportunity for a proper defence. After a long fight by relatives and SAD campaigners, formal pardons were secured from the High Court in 2006 in recognition of the fact that a number of these soldiers were underage when they volunteered and many would have been suffering from shell shock or post traumatic stress disorder.
A statue on the plot by Andy DeComyn is modelled on Private Herbert Burden who was shot at Ypres in 1915 aged 17. The names of the other victims are listed on stakes arranged around the statue in the form of a Greek theatre, symbolising the tragedy of these poor victims.
It gives me a reason to make a return trip next time I am in the area. I will do so gladly as the arboretum offers a positive, communal place of remembrance in contrast to the bleak and often solitary experience of visiting graveyards or other poorly maintained memorials.
