Monument allemand du cimetière Saint-Charles

English translation

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History

With the stabilization of the front, the year 1915 saw the construction of several monuments in the Ardennes to celebrate the strength of the invading armies, but also the sacrifice of soldiers, sometimes from both sides. At the Saint-Charles cemetery in Sedan, the Germans decided to expand the area they already occupied with the large collective grave created in August-September 1914 and wanted to build there the monument we are discussing here. A large surrounding wall enclosed the entire square where nearly 500 German soldiers were buried. A large inscription, today partly disappeared, adorns the frontispiece. It is a poetic text by Joseph von Lauff, here translated: "Fighting for the Emperor and the Empire, God has taken from us the earthly sun. Now, freed from all earthly things, his eternal light illuminates us. Sacred be this place, which you have consecrated by bloody victims. Thrice sacred for us through the sacrifice of thanksgiving". The construction of the monument lasted from June to October 1915. It is the work of architect Ludwig Lony and was the subject of significant communication at the time. A double page is devoted to it in the German journal Beilage zum Champagne Kamerad of 5 November 1916 and numerous postcards were published. Doctor Gustave Kertz, German military chaplain and doctor of philosophy, left in his memoirs, written in French as early as 1916, these comments: "I buried him beside his comrades in the cemetery of heroes at Sedan" and further on, "German art, German industrial genius succeeded, despite the greatest difficulties, in raising to the memory of the comrades a monument worthy of them and perfectly adapted to its purpose. They managed to make the German honour cemetery a place of solemn rest entirely separate from what surrounds it. [*] ". This example allows us to consider that this monument is truly perceived at the time as a war memorial, and not as a monument in honour of the greatness of Germany or its Kaiser. The German monument at the Saint-Charles cemetery in Sedan, comprising its terrace and its access steps, presents an interest because of its architecture inspired by Antiquity, its resolutely modern implementation in 1915. (http://le-souvenir-francais.fr/la-lettre/le-monument-allemand-du-cimetiere-saint-charles-de-sedan/)