Four years after the end of the First World War, the Belgian Government decided, following what had already happened in some of our Allied partner countries, to designate and bury an unknown soldier in memory of the fallen from the Great War at the foot of the Congress Column in Brussels.  This year it is exactly 100 years ago that this special event in our national history took place. Prior to a special edition of the traditional commemoration on Armistice Day to the "Unknown Soldier" in Brussels, the "Choice of the Unknown Soldier" is also commemorated.

By analogy with the procedure devised 100 years ago, at five Belgian military cemeteries, from where the coffins with the remains of fallen unknown soldiers were exhumed (Namur, Liège, Lier, Adegem and Keiem), urns with earth to be filled. These urns will then be transferred to Bruges in a Lynx armored vehicle, escorted by the Military Police, where they will be set up on Wednesday afternoon, November 9, 2022, after a reception with military honors in the Bruges town hall.

On Thursday 10 November 2022, the historic date of the “Choice of the Unknown Soldier”, these urns will be received at the Belgian military cemetery in Bruges, where the four unknown fallen soldiers who were not chosen as the “Unknown Soldier” in 1922 were buried. During a military-civil ceremony, attended by the Representative of H.M. the King, and with a Defense contribution in the form of an Honorary Detachment (Bn ISTAR, godfather unit of the city of Bruges) and the Royal Music Chapel of the Navy, a of the five urns are randomly designated by a relative (niece) of de Reinold Haesebrouck, the blind war invalid who designated the “Unknown Soldier” in 1922. This urn then leaves with military escort to Brussels for integration into the ceremony on 11 November at the grave of the “Unknown Soldier”.  The earth in the urns left behind will be scattered on Armistice Day in Bruges in four flower beds, which were laid out as a lasting memory of the "Choice of the Unknown Soldier" in Bruges near the King Albert I monument (near the former Bruges train station where this historic event took place).

Wednesday 9th November 2022 - 100 years of unknown soldier - The ceremony 'Gathering of the Soil' - Keiem Belgian Military Cemetery

During this ceremony, earth is collected. This symbolizes the West-Flanders region as one of the five main battlefields in Belgium during the First World War.