The King's Pilgrimage: Enduring Impact and Legacy

This month Christopher will be joining us for the first time to talk about the nature and contrasting legacy of two post-war visits abroad by King George V, the relatively well-known tour ('The King's Pilgrimage') of the British war cemeteries in Flanders and France in May 1922, and the lesser-known tour to Italy in May 1923. For the Western Front, the talk will focus on the tour's souvenir book, the poem by Rudyard Kipling, and the role played by Kipling and others in the King's famous speech at the culmination of the tour, with examples of the subsequent political, social and cultural impact, and responses to the poem and speech (which continue to this day!) giving an insight into interwar diplomacy and commemorative practices. This will be compared to the tour of Italy a year later, including reflections on a newly-discovered Italian translation of the King's 1923 speech.

The presentation is lavishly illustrated with extracts and photographs from contemporary newspapers and books, and from the archives of the Commonwealth War Graves Commission. It includes a surprising discovery concerning the origins of a haunting war graves photograph of King George V.

Christopher gained an MA from the University of Kent in 2022 with a dissertation on the Imperial War Graves Commission's cathedral tablets. His subsequent research and publications range from interwar commemorative practices to wartime botanical collections. He is currently an Honorary Research Associate at Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew.

Members and non-members of The Western Front Association are equally welcome. Any new visitors are guaranteed a friendly atmosphere and a warm welcome from a group of like-minded enthusiasts.

Main image: King George V at his cousin, Maurice of Battenburg's grave Ypres Town Cemetery.