Victoria Abrahamyan
Forensic practices aimed at identifying fallen soldiers, determining the fate of the corpse, and, in many cases, uncovering the nature of violence inflicted upon their bodies have become a standard aspect of contemporary post-conflict efforts. Rather than taking this for granted, a historical perspective reveals how war forensics emerged, how advancements in medicine and science influenced human perceptions of death, and how these shifts shaped post-conflict memorial practices and narratives.
In this context, the First World War and the interwar period provide a compelling framework for exploring the genesis of modern war forensics. While roots of such efforts can be traced back to the 19th century, they became more systematic and institutionalised in the aftermath of World War I. The unprecedented scale of loss and suffering led to significant changes in burial practices, largely due to intense pressure exercised from the families of fallen soldiers who demanded dignified burials and national recognition. This marked a departure from earlier traditions, in which only military elites received formal commemoration.
As early as 1919, the British Army began searching the battlefields of France and Belgium for both individual and mass graves, aiming to locate, identify, and inter British and Commonwealth soldiers in individual graves. These efforts were carried out without regard to military rank or social class, and although the bodies were not repatriated, the new burial practices reflected a shift in the cultural treatment of the war dead.
Crucially, France and Britain adopted fundamentally different approaches to the burial of their war dead. While French authorities initially prohibited the exhumation and repatriation of soldiers’ remains, this policy changed after the war. The law of 31 July 1920 granted families the right to request the return of their loved ones’ remains at the state’s expense. This marked a significant shift: French authorities chose to prioritise the individual treatment of each body in the management of wartime causalities. These processes raised important questions about belonging and sovereignty over the dead: To whom did the fallen belong— their families or the state? Scholars have long recognised that locating, identifying, burying, and commemorating the dead are not only military but also deeply political acts.
Existing research has highlighted the immense challenges involved in clearing the battlefields after the First World War—particularly the identification of corpses. Although attempts were made to use name tags for recognition, a substantial number of the dead remained unidentified in the war’s aftermath. Key questions remain: Who was responsible for searching for and burying the dead, and how was this process carried out? What methods were employed to identify bodies, what obstacles arose, and how were identification errors addressed? Moreover, what kinds of transgressive practices—such as corpse smuggling—emerged as a result of the divergent burial policies adopted by France and Britain? What were the underlying power dynamics, and how was the notion of governmentality exercised over the dead in the mass treatment of corpses?
This research project aims to address these questions through a comparative approach. It examines British and French exhumation practices, the management of bodies, identification techniques, the so-called naming regime, and the issue of missing persons—both genuinely unaccounted for and those deliberately rendered “missing.” Additionally, the study interrogates the role of the colonial enterprise in shaping these practices. By foregrounding the empire, this research seeks to contribute to broader scholarly conversations on war memory and commemoration. It aims to reflect more accurately the multi-ethnic composition of the Allied forces and to illuminate the distinct imperial dimensions of death, corpse identification, and the forensic methodologies employed in the post-war period.
