A First World War soldier who could not be identified by the Department of National Defence (DND) and the Canadian Armed Forces was laid to rest last Wednesday with military honours at Canadian Cemetery No. 2 in Neuville-St. Vaast, France, within Canadian National Vimy Memorial Park. The Commander of the Canadian Army, Lieutenant-General Paul Wynnyk, was in attendance at the ceremony.
Unidentified Canadian soldier, who died at Vimy during WWI, was laid to rest in Canadian Cemetery No. 2, Neuville-St. Vaast, France. Photo: Department of National Defence and the Canadian Armed Forces.
Remains discovered at Thélus, Pas de Calais, France, were deemed to belong to a Canadian First World War soldier, but his identity could not be determined as he was found without personal or unit identifiers. The only item found was a metal “CANADA” insignia such as would have been worn on a military tunic.
The soldier would have died between the end of October 1916 and the end of July 1917, the nine-month period of Canadian Corps action in the Vimy sector.
Brigadier-General (Ret.) David Kettle, secretary general of the Canadian Agency of the Commonwealth War Graves Commission, said, “While we could not engrave a name on his headstone, we are gratified to have been able to afford this soldier the respect and dignity of a military burial in a Commonwealth cemetery, 100 years after his sacrifice.”
The remains were discovered by the Service archéologique municipal d’Arras on September 27, 2012, during an excavation prior to the construction of an industrial estate. The Commonwealth War Graves Commission was notified, and took possession of the remains and associated artifacts. The case was subsequently investigated and closed by DND’s Casualty Identification Program.
DNA
Both maternal and paternal DNA profiles have been obtained from this set of remains with the hope of a future identification. A stable isotope profile, which can help determine where a person grew up and where they spent the last years of their life, was also taken.
Canadian Cemetery No. 2 was established by the Canadian Corps after the storming of Vimy Ridge on April 9, 1917. Some of those buried in the cemetery fell in that battle or died of wounds received there, although the majority of the graves were later made for the burial of the dead recovered from surrounding battlefields and from isolated graves which were transferred into the cemetery over a period of years following the Armistice. The cemetery commemorates nearly 3000 casualties of the First World War.
