The British press are at it again - there is TV coverage of this on C4 this
afternoon... the Sun is known to be over sensationalist but make your own
minds up
GHOULS DIG UP WAR HEROES
Digging up history ... these locals were allowed to unearth old ammunition
EXCLUSIVE
By OLIVER HARVEY
GANGS of treasure-hunting ghouls are digging up the bodies of British
soldiers killed in the First World War - to flog their belongings on a sick
black market.
As Armistice Day today marks the end of the "War To End All Wars" exactly 82
years ago, investigators have found a thriving trade in weapons, badges,
jewellery and other relics robbed from hero Tommies.
Tomb raiders armed with metal detectors and spades are plundering the
battlefields of Belgium where 50,000 British troops still lie unburied.
Last night the ghastly trafficking in their remains outraged survivors of
the war. One ex-gunner said: "It's not human - it's just greed."
The trade in memorabilia centres round the Flanders town of Ypres - known to
Tommies as "Wipers".
Found ... a British rifle and ammo
Once a month 1,000 collectors and dealers gather at a pub to buy and
exchange items.
But there is also a network of unscrupulous collectors who plunder their
trophies straight from the dead.
A report by television station LWT secretly filmed one dealer at a military
fair bragging: "There's a chap who doesn't even have a metal detector.
"He just goes, he's got plans of the trenches and starts digging.
"He's found three British chaps, one of the Guards - don't ask me if it's
Coldstream or Grenadier or something.
Preserved ... an Army trench coat
"It was amazing what they had. Austrian money in their pockets, their
helmets, leather gloves, their rifles.
"But instead of bloody reporting them, he just, whoops, took all the stuff
off them."
Another collector was secretly videoed showing off a crucifix still wrapped
in the material of a uniform pocket.
And he was caught on camera boasting: "This is something I've got which is
very nice. It's a British officer's ring. Gold with a diamond.
"I always tell my wife one day I'd come home with gold."
Grim discovery ... Belgian workers reveal artefacts they found legally near
Ypres
When The Sun confronted the owner of the pub where the monthly dealing takes
place, he insisted the items had been legally obtained.
But he admitted he knew "a couple of hundred" local people who scavenge from
the dead.
Giovanni Floryssoone, 26, said: "A lot of people do it that way. But they
don't sell it here, you can see it. They sell it in their cars and at home."
Ypres Council spokesman Frans Lignel said: "People can make a lot of money
out of souvenirs. They are without respect for history.
"We have asked police to patrol at night but it is such a big place.
Sickening ... investigators found a thriving trade in items stolen from dead
Tommies
"It is not difficult in the darkness to dig up bodies and weapons."
Piet Chielens, co-ordinator of the In Flanders Fields Museum in Ypres,
described a massacre site at the hamlet of Boezinge which fell prey to
scavengers.
Mr Chielens said: "Boezinge was the scene of a gas attack by the Germans in
1915 and the soldiers didn't have a chance to bury their corpses.
"In 1998 development began to extend an industrial estate.
"The archaeologist told the council about it. They ordered the police to
patrol the site day and night.
"Even then you had theft, robbery and abuse of human remains."
Ypres Council has granted a licence to a nine-strong group of amateur
archaeologists known as The Diggers to excavate the site.
The Diggers have unearthed 103 corpses in two years to be reinterred for
proper burial.
But even THEY are accused in the LWT show of hindering the identification of
remains and keeping the regimental insignia of at least one soldier.
Last night 1914-18 survivors were disgusted to hear how old comrades were
being looted of helmets, badges, ammunition and personal effects.
Albert "Smiler" Marshall, 102, who served in the Essex Yeomanry, "It's
absolutely terrible."
Dennis Goodwin, chairman of the First World War Veterans' Association, said
last night: "It's totally repulsive."
Gerald Howarth, Tory MP for Aldershot, home of the British Army, said: "This
is tantamount to grave-robbing of soldiers who fought not only for the
freedom of this country but Belgium as well."
The LWT investigation, Battlefield Scavengers, is to be screened at 5.05pm
tomorrow.
'Cemeteries next' fear
WORRIED relatives of men killed in Belgium voiced fears last night that
grave-robbers will switch from digging up battlefields to official war
cemeteries.
Les Stammers, whose wife's missing uncle Private Frank King was only
recently found and identified, said: "What is the next step? The next step
is to go down to the local cemetery and start there with metal detectors. I
mean where does it stop?" Les, of Saffron Walden, Essex, who attended
Private King's full military funeral with wife Mandy, added: "Just because
it was 80 years ago doesn't make it right."
Bodies lost under a sea of mud churned up by ceaseless shellfire are still
being unearthed.
The Commonwealth War Graves Commission makes every effort to identify
corpses removed by volunteer group The Diggers before they are taken to
several nearby military graveyards.
As recently as last month 12 newly-found Tommies - including an officer from
the York and Lancaster Regiment, two Lancashire Fusiliers, a Northumberland
Fusilier and three men of the Rifle Brigade - were buried at Cement Hill
Cemetery. Diggers' spokesman Aurel Scrcu denied his group hindered
identification or retained possessions.
He said: "We don't sell the stuff we find and we invite anybody to come and
see what we do.
"The alternatives are to try to find the men's identities and give them a
decent burial - or leave them where they are to be tossed about by
bulldozers and buried forever under concrete."
43 million will
honour the dead
By JOHN KAY
BRITAIN will come to a halt at 11am today as more than 43 million people
remember the nation's war dead.
Clock chimes across the nation are to mark the start of a two-minute silence
at the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month.
It was the moment in 1918 when the First World War fighting ended.
When The Sun backed the Royal British Legion's campaign to bring back the
silence in 1995, 57 per cent of the UK supported the move.
Last year the figure was up to 73 per cent - 43 million people.
The Legion reckoned that even more would join in today because it is a
Saturday.
Supermarkets will close their checkouts at 11am as shopping centres stop
operating for two minutes.
Tesco, Sainsbury's, Waitrose, Asda, Morrisons, Next, the Co-op and the Post
Office, are among those who have pledged support.
BBC TV and radio stations will also mark the silence, as will independent
broadcasters including IRN and Sky.
Hundreds of local authorities are backing the silence call.
And airports, bus companies, football clubs and rail stations will also mark
the moment.
A Legion spokesman said: "The silence will be observed the length and
breadth of the land as men, women and children break off from whatever they
are doing."
And Prime Minister Tony Blair said: "The first Remembrance Day of the
century provides an important opportunity to reflect on the debt owed to
those who fought and died so we can all enjoy peace and freedom."
There will be religious services throughout Britain tomorrow to mark
Remembrance Sunday, including the traditional wreath-laying at the Cenotaph
in Whitehall.
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