142 Chapel at US cemetery at Suresnes in the Paris suburbs

This chapel is in the US cemetery at Suresnes in the Paris suburbs. The cemetery contains the remains of 1541 US soldiers from the First World War, and 24 unidentified soldiers from the Second. I know that in the First World War, British families were not allowed to repatriate to the UK the bodies of their dead sons (the government feared the effect on civilian morale and/or protests about the richer families being privileged because they had the money to do this). I don’t know if repatriation to the US was banned, but it would have been expensive and certainly was not habitual.

Apparently, earlier in the war, dead French soldiers were buried in mass graves, as had been the case in previous wars. Public opinion demanded a change and from 1915, soldiers had individual graves.

The cemetery was inaugurated in pomp by US President Wilson in 1919.

There are mosaic fresques on grand themes, and there is also a memorial to those lost at sea in the First War.

The visitor’s book has its rules written in: no politics, no drawings.