Learn more about this designated historic site as well as the concept, construction and design of the monument. Canadian National Vimy Memorial. Visit Vimy Find contact information and learn more about visiting the memorial site.
Visitor education centre Learn about our new centre. Take a Virtual Tour Visit Vimy from anywhere in the world using virtual reality, video and web-based tools. Important notice Visitor centres are open! A Nation Grieves A brief overview of the memorial, its history and significance. Battle of Vimy Ridge Learn more about this historic battle through lesson plans and historical information.
As the official ceremonies began, the Pilgrims fell in to ranks as though on parade. Crowded around the Vimy Memorial were more than , people. The King delivered a brief speech in both English and French, before pulling the drawstring on the Union Jack that cloaked the Canada Bereft figure, officially unveiling the Vimy Memorial.
The Last Post was sounded, followed by two minutes silence, ended by the sounding of Reveille. In the valley leading to the Douai Plain, artillery cracked a gun salute that reverberated across the old battlefield.
Following along back home, the entire ceremony was broadcast live to Canada by the Canadian Radio Broadcasting Commission. The original Vimy Pilgrimage was supported by the government, which waved passport fees and even issued special Vimy Pilgrimage passports. The Canadian Legion also coordinated the lodging and transportation for the pilgrims. In , when France was occupied by the Nazis, Adolf Hitler visited the site.
Despite fears that it would be destroyed, the occupying forces did not harm the memorial. In the early s in advance of the 90th anniversary of the battle, the memorial underwent extensive restoration work, and the restored site was unveiled in by Queen Elizabeth II. The memorial was the site of the centenary commemorations of the battle in April Walter Seymour Allward was born in Toronto on 18 November He is best known for his work designing and sculpting the Canadian National Vimy Memorial.
While a teenager studying at Central Technical School in Toronto, he trained as a carpenter under his father, and eventually began an apprenticeship at the architectural firm Gibson and Simpson. His first commission was a monument to the North-West Rebellion, and other commissions followed for memorials to the War of and the South African War. After drafting design sketches, Allward submitted his proposal for the monument to the fallen Canadians of the Great War to the design competition run by the Canadian Battlefields Memorials Commission.
In , his design was selected from among submissions, and shortly thereafter it was decided by the Commission that his design would be built at Vimy Ridge. Allward set up a studio in London in , which he used as a base while he travelled Europe in search of a suitable material for the monument. It is a place where may people believe the hard work, planning and sacrifice of so many Canadians, proved to the world that we were a Nation, an equal on the international stage, and not just a colony of the British Empire.
Created by Canadian sculptor Walter Seymour Allward, the area around it was designated Canadian territory by France in gratitude for our efforts in the war.
It is impossible to not be touched with pride for this great nation after seeing the carvings by Canadian soldiers in the tunnels and trenches, many featuring the maple leaf which had yet to become such a famous symbol for us.
A memorial stands there a symbol of Canadian struggle and coming of age in the Great War, earning Canada a separate seat in the Versailles Treaty. It is also original from the other suggestions as it is a symbol of Canada that is overseas. Rare is the Canadian visiting Vimy who is not inspired by the self-sacrifice it represents - an obligation of the living to remember those who died securing the country we, by birth or adoption, cherish.
Nor can anyone who walks through the trenches and eerily unnatural scarred battle field be untouched by the horrors of war. The Vimy Memorial somehow reflects something about ourselves.
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