Poelkapelle Monument

The Poelkapelle Monument is a monument and cemetery in the area of Langemark-Poelkapelle in Belgium. The Poelkapelle Monument includes the graves of 515 soldiers who died during the Battle of Poelcappelle in 9 October 1917, and a large central cross monument to mark the unknown dead, and those of other battles of the Great War.

History
Work on the National War Monument was completed in Koningstad in 1919, but over in Belgium there were thousands of dead still buried in the battlefields with makeshift wooded crosses. Members in the Johan Anderson, led by the Prime Minister himself, felt that something had to be done for them. Repatriation was impossible so plans began on making stone markers for each soldier buried, and a monument for the unknown, which was decided for the area of Langemark-Poelkapelle, where in 1917 Brunant suffered its greatest ever one-day deaths.

The Anderson government fell in early 1920 before work could commence, and the Hertz government which came in authorized work on the tombstones and arrangement of a < > cemetery in late 1920. Work on selecting a monument began in 1921 with a competition, but only four finalist designs had been selected by the time his government was forced out of office in 1923 and was succeeded by Maarten Dolmatoff's Communist Front. Between 1923 and 1927 Hertz would replace Dolmatoff and in turn Dolmatoff would replace him, and the domestic issues and conflict put the Poelkapelle project on hold.

In 1927 though, Anderson returned to office and in one of his government's first acts, a simple cross design by Italian Massimo Tedeschi was chosen, and work was completed in October 1929. By then Augustus Van der Ecke and Andrew Reading succeeded Anderson in office, and under Reading's government a ceremony was organized for its official unveiling, attended by King Johan II.