Rob Heard has spent the last five years creating a shroud for every single soldier who lost their life at The Battle of the Somme — and his mission is complete
IT is the picture that graphically shows the unimaginable scale and futility of the First World War’s bloodiest battle.
The Sun has been following artist Rob Heard’s five-year mission to make a miniature figure and shroud for EVERY British and Commonwealth soldier who died at the Battle of the Somme without a grave — and his work is now complete.
The remains of 72,396 men still lie undiscovered in the fields of Northern France where their bodies were swallowed in mud.
But now they have come home at last — as each is represented in Rob’s incredible work, Shrouds Of The Somme, by plastic figures and calico shrouds he has hand-crafted and bound with ribbons.
A team of 25 soldiers and volunteers has taken 500 man hours to lay the shrouds over an area of grass 137 metres by 30 metres at East London’s Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park, for the public to view for free until November 18.
Yesterday, under leaden skies, the last of the 72,396 figures was set down by a soldier who served in the Falklands and Africa.
PRIMARY school teacher Sally Nicholson travelled from Northampton to see the shrouds.
Sally, 34, was remembering her two great- great uncles, L/Cpl Ernest Nicholson and his brother, Pte Sidney Nicholson, and who were in the Kings Royal Rifle Corps at the Somme.
Sidney, 22, was shot dead by a sniper after going over the top, while 26-year-old Ernest survived.
Sally says: “Ernest had the task of writing to tell their mother that Sid was dead and his body could not be recovered from the mud.
“ The shrouds are a fitting tribute to seventy two and a half thousand men like Sid.”
Lance Corporal Joe Woolley, of the 1st Battalion Royal Anglian Regiment, placed the final 12in figure on the field, while carrying a flag that covered the coffin of a soldier whose body was flown home from Afghanistan ten years ago.
The sea of shrouds represents every soldier whose name is carved into the walls of the Thiepval Memorial in northern France — where Rob last month laid 1,500 of his figures before bringing them back to Britain.
Now, for the first time ever, all their names will be on display in Britain, and visitors to the Olympic Park — where the first Invictus Games for war wounded, sick and injured was held in 2014 — can check if a family member is featured.
MORE than 6,000 crosses and other markers have been planted at Cardiff Castle to create a Royal British Legion Field of Remembrance.
Each has a message honouring those who died during World War One and other conflicts.
More than 100,000 tributes are expected across six RBL sites, including Gateshead, Staffs and Royal Wootton Bassett.
But those 72,396 are only a fraction of the more than 700,000 British Tommies killed in action in the Great War. The Battle of the Somme alone, between July and November 1916, claimed more than 600,000 British and French casualties plus more than 500,000 Germans.
German officer Friedrich Steinbrecher wrote: “Somme — the whole history of the world cannot contain a more ghastly word.”
Rob, 53, started his incredible project after a car accident left him with limited movement in his hands and no longer able to work as a carpenter.
He said: “Standing among all the shrouds affects me. I am certainly not hardened to it, as I thought I would be. It gives me goosebumps. Their real bodies are laying out in France in the dirt, turned by the plough every year. But here they are — for the first time in 100 years these men are at last laying on British soil again.”
At 3pm yesterday the last shroud was laid, by L/Cpl Woolley. It is an extra one that Rob created to represent all the fallen of every conflict.
Rob says: “I struggled with the judgment that some men were not included on the Thiepval Memorial as they died two days after the Battle of the Somme’s official end date, or 150 yards to the east. So I came up with the idea of an extra shroud that represents everybody else who died.”
Rob began his labour of love in 2013 and took a year and a half just to stitch the shrouds, then completed sometimes as many as 200 figures a day — painstakingly ticking off their names in 13 books as big as phone directories.
He built a shed at the bottom of his garden, in Watchet, Somerset, to create his figures then carefully stored away each one when it was finished.
KATE BRAZIER fought back tears as she gazed at the sea of shrouds.
Her great, great uncle, Lt Finlay Kerr, is one of the 72,396 Somme casualties without a grave. He was just 22 when he died on July 5, 1916.
Kate, 54, from Canterbury, a commander in the First Aid Nursing Yeomanry, said of the Olympic Park exhibit: “Just look at it. All that waste of life and they don’t even know where these people are buried. How can this number of people just be swallowed up?
“Every shroud is different. They have their hands in different places, some have the binding over their eyes. You realise you are holding a representation of a human life in your hands.”
Photos of many of those missing men of the Somme stare out from posters on the walls of the shed.
Rob says: “It was very important that just one person created these figures, that it didn’t become a factory line.
“Once I started on the project, I couldn’t stop.”
L/Cpl Woolley, who has served for four years with the Royal Anglians, said of his ceremonial duty at the Olympic Park: “It was an honour to represent the Army, on behalf of a very grateful nation.”
Here, two women who visited the exhibit to honour long-lost family reveal what it means to them.
POPPY hero Vera Parnaby has raised more than £1million for veterans after devoting 73 years of her life to the Royal British Legion, writes Robin Perrie.
Vera, 79, started selling poppies in the same year World War Two started aged just six.
She has been the co- ordinator of her local appeal for the past 23 years and her home is adorned with the symbol.
The great-gran, of Consett, Co Durham, said: “I keep going for the good it is doing for the ex- service people, those who need help, those in need.
“I hope the poppy appeal will have more meaning for people this year with it being 100 years since the end of the First World War.”
The British Legion’s Peter Milne said: “She is an incredible asset.”
