China’s Role in World War One Remembered in the Pyrénées-Orientales

Just can’t get away from China references! Happen to be writing about China’s involvement in the First World War at the moment what with the centenary up next year – more on that to follow as it progresses. And then happened to be passing through the town of Vernet Les Bains in the Pyrénées-Orientales and came across the town’s Entente Cordiale monument – the only one in France apparently. Of course every French town has a memorial to the men of the area who fell in the war but this monument is a bit different as it celebrates the alliance between Britain and France – and all the other nations that supported the Allies in the Great War. While China wasn’t actually a combatant it did side with the allies and sent the Chinese Labour Corps to Europe so should really be included. And so it is….(more on the memorial from Wikipedia below)…

Near the highest point in Vernet-les-Bains, next to the mairie (town hall), stands a monument to the Entente Cordiale of 1904. It is the only one of its kind in France.

The pedestal of the monument is made of Canigou granite. On it rest two white marble statues representing France and Britain. The pedestal itself is set upon a circular base. That in turn is located on a raised, level area of ground which covers 1,000 square metres and which is bounded by low stone walls.

The idea of erecting this monument was conceived around 1912 by the town council and its then mayor, Monsieur Joseph Mercader. The wealthy British visitors who regularly came to this health spa at that time actively supported the project. A committee of prominent French and British patrons was set up to promote the scheme. Its leading members were Lord Roberts and General Joffre. Monsieur Lambert-Violet, a leading Perpignan businessman, gave the land for the memorial to Vernet. The monument itself was the work of the Roussillon sculptor Gustave Violet, who displayed a model of his proposed work in 1913. However, progress came to a halt in 1914 with the outbreak of World War One. Little further happened until August 1920, when it was proclaimed by presidential decree that work on the monument would proceed but that it would be dedicated both to the Entente Cordiale and to the memory of those killed during the war. At the same time a new appeal was launched for funds to complete the project.

Work on erecting the monument soon got underway. Granite was hauled up from the bed of the River St-Vincent in carts pulled by oxen. The stonemason, Monsieur Herbetta, worked up to fourteen hours a day, often in the sun’s full glare, fashioning and putting into place the enormously heavy blocks of stone. A circle of wrought-iron fencing was erected around the base of the monument. Monsieur Antoine Mercader remembers, as a six-year-old child, how he and other children watched with amazement as the craftsman, Monsieur Serra, poured molten lead into small holes in the ground to seal in place the fence’s iron bars. When the monument was completed, it bore the following dedications:

“To the Entente Cordiale between France and Britain. To the glory of the Allied Nations. To the memory of soldiers from Vernet who died for their country”