Final journey

Cheltenham author and volunteer on the Gloucestershire Warwickshire Steam Railway (GWSR), Nicolas Wheatley, recounts the fascinating story of funeral trains

- Cheltenham

November 11, 2020 marked the centenary of the burial within Westminster Abbey of the Unknown Warrior.

This was a British soldier who was killed in the Great War, now called the First World War, someone who was originally buried in or near one of the many battlefields of the Western Front. Following an idea attributed to the Reverend David Railton, a military chaplain who had served with the army during the War, several bodies were exhumed and great care was taken to choose one that was unidentifiable. This enabled the Unknown Warrior to represent any one of nearly a million British servicemen who gave their lives in the service of King and Country.

He could have been the son, husband, brother or other loved one of many families who did not return home, and in his new identity as the Unknown Warrior he provided a focus for many grieving relatives.

His burial in Westminster Abbey showed the degree of respect accorded to this important but anonymous individual. On the day of his burial, a large procession travelled from Victoria Station down Whitehall, stopping to allow His Majesty King George V to unveil the Cenotaph, now the focus for the national acts of remembrance that take place every November. What is often overlooked, however, is the role that railways played in the repatriation of the Unknown Warrior to bring his body to London.