The project description

The City of Ypres holds an original copy of Ireland’s Memorial Records. Field-Marshall Sir John French, Lord Lieutenant of Ireland (1919-1922), ordered these records to be made up and published. Being the commander of the B.E.F. during the 1st and 2nd Battles of Ypres in 1914 and 1915, he had been honoured by the British Government with the title of First Earl of Ypres and felt obliged to donate a copy of the finished records to the city.

The Committee of the Irish National War Memorial recorded some 49,000 names to be published in 1923. Alphabetically listed in eight leather bound volumes, the register was beautifully illustrated by the Irish artist Harry Clarke. The Ypres copy and its original made to measure cabinet is on permanent display in the In Flanders Fields Museum.

This search engine opens up the information as it is published in the records. Preliminary research proved that more than 10,000 of the men listed to have died in France actually fell in Belgium. Correct details about their place of burial or commemoration have been added, as part of the ongoing In Flanders Fields Museum project called The Name List. This project aims to assemble all fatalities of the Great War who died or were mortally wounded in Belgium, both civilian and military, and whatever their nationality. The Name List will be launched on 4 August 2014. A completion of the Irish Memorial Records, beyond the casualties linked to Belgian territory, should be ready by the end of 2014.