In a recent article the story of the twelve men of Iron, a village in the Aisne department, was related. This is recounted in much more detail on Hedley Malloch's own website, also quoted in the recent article, which explains the efforts being made to reach a number of objectives:
- to restore and improve Vincent Chalandre's resting place in Guise's local cemetery
- to finance and create a memorial in the village of Iron dedicated to the British and Irish soldiers and the French men and women who came to their assistance, in spite of the danger thay were putting themselves in
- to turn the execution site on the chateau grounds into a memorial site that could take the form of a permanent camp (with new facilities) for the historical projects undertaken there with teenagers, under the leadership of Rosalind Guillemin, a British citizen based in Guise with her French husband.
Hedley Malloch is committed to ticking each of these objectives and being able to say: DONE.
We are very happy to report that the Mayor of Guise, Mr Hugues Cochet, has come up trumps and done the paperwork to allow Chalandre a decent burial place. The above photos show the work that has been done by Guise's council together with pictures of the British and Irish soldiers' graves.
All were executed by the German occupiers in the First World War. They all lie together in Guise's town cemetery.
After fixing an explanatory plaque to Chalandre's grave, Hedley will try to tackle the remaining two objectives on his list.
