Prince Maurice of Battenberg was the only direct member of the British Royal Family to be killed in the Great War. He was buried in the main city cemetery of Ypres in October 1914. His mother appealed for the right to repatriate his body, which she followed up with a concerted campaign to erect a headstone of her choice over his grave. These demands coming from such an influential person made Prince Maurice’s body, and the memory of him as a person, a test case for the authority of the newly-forged Imperial War Graves Commission. Determined to uphold the principles of non-repatriation and equality of treatment, the IWGC had to fight a delicate battle in which an individual’s body was subsumed into wider arguments about class, identity and the very meaning of the war itself.
Professor Mark Connelly (University of Kent)
Venue: Reading Room, In Flanders Fields Research Centre, Sint Maartensplein 3, 8900 Ieper
This event is part of the First World War Seminar Series organised by In Flanders Fields Museum and Gateways to the First World War. All seminars are free and open to all. The full seminar programme is published here.
Meer informatie / more information:
kenniscentrum@ieper.be
gateways@kent.ac.uk
