6 . Marzabotto . Remains of the San Martino di Monte Sole Cathedral . NicFer , ( Wikimedia Commons )
The rise of the martyr
Alongside the cult of the hero in 1945 , there also grew up a parallel cult of the martyr . The celebrations of VE Day were often overshadowed by the memory of the countless millions who had been killed during the war . Many of the largest Soviet memorials , including Treptower Park , also mark the burial sites of thousands upon thousands of people . The most visited memorial to American soldiers in Europe is the cemetery in Normandy , where US presidents regularly come to commemorate American sacrifices on the anniversary of D-Day . The most sacred war monument in Britain is the Cenotaph in London , where politicians gather on Remembrance Day each year to honour “ the glorious dead ”.
Amongst the most moving of monuments to the dead are those to the martyred villages where whole populations were massacred by the Nazis during the war . There are countless examples : Lidice in the Czech Republic , Distomo in Greece , Marzabotto in Italy – the list goes on . In central France , not far from the city of Limoges , lies the village of Oradoursur-Glane , where 642 men , women and children were massacred by the Waffen-SS in 1944 , before the whole village was put to the torch . In the immediate aftermath of the war the remains of the village were declared a national monument , and the ruins preserved exactly as they had been on the day of the massacre . One can still walk through it today and see the pathetic relics of that tragic day : the abandoned car of the local doctor , the skeleton of a babycarriage in the ruins of the local church , the old bicycles , and sewing-machines , and pots and pans – all the machinery of everyday life that was snuffed out in an instant .
Easily the most common monuments to martyrdom , however , are those to the murdered Jews of Europe . Once rare , they are now ubiquitous . They
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Observing Memories Issue 6