Memorializing Scotland's war heroes

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The Scottish National War Memorial is a gem of art and architecture that too few people know about. Patricia Andrew welcomes a new book that celebrates this extraordinary creation.

Scotland’s Shrine: The Scottish National War Memorial by Duncan Macmillan with photography by Antonia Reeve

The Scottish National War Memorial is one of the most ambitious and remarkable examples of combined artistic and architectural achievement in Britain, and deserves to be better recognized than it currently is. Its location within the precincts of Edinburgh Castle, a fortress-cum- mini-village, which the visitor now has to pay handsomely to enter (standard ticket price £16), means that it tends to be less well known than it should be. Most of its visitors are in fact tourists, or Scots who are visiting in groups with the primary intention of paying their respects to the fallen. Only when they arrive do they become aware of the Memorial’s appearance, and start to notice the amazing art and architecture it comprises – I say this as a local who has taken parties there myself, and also listened as an anonymous eavesdropper.

There have been various publications on the Memorial since it was opened in 1927, but a new one was sorely needed, especially at the centenary of the War that it was built to commemorate. Duncan Macmillan’s full, updated historical and artistic account is therefore very welcome, particularly as it is enriched by Antonia Reeve’s stunning new photography, which enables the reader to enjoy many of the features located too high up in the building to be fully appreciated from ground level.

The Scottish National War Memorial opened a decade after a committee was set up to plan and create it. It was funded by public subscription (a poster and fundraising stamps are shown in the book) but at the start it ran into great controversy owing to its preferred location at the Castle. There were concerns that the building might alter the profile of the Castle, and thus the city’s skyline. In fact Sir Robert Lorimer, who was appointed architect, proved a brilliant choice. A distinguished architect, who had designed the Chapel of the Order of the Thistle appended to St Giles Cathedral, Lorimer was sensitive to the Castle’s architecture as well as to what the public might regard as ‘suitable art’. He gathered together a large team of artists and craftsmen, creating a building which comprises architecture, sculpture, glass, metalwork and natural elements – the ‘living’ Castle rock comes through the floor of its central room, the Shrine.

The processional friezes encircling the Shrine werebased on drawings by Morris Meredith Williams, who had served in the War, and modelled by his wife Alice Meredith Williams (who was also responsible for the figure of St Michael hanging high in The Shrine). They set out to include representatives of every rank and unit of every service that had fought, or been involved, in the War, and in every location. They are incredibly detailed, the individuality of each person featured showing through; particular attention was paid to the inclusion of women’s services within the scheme. Much of the clear, unfussy stone carving was by Charles D'Orville Pilkington Jackson (1887–1973), while the very popular animal vignettes were made by Phyllis Bone (1894–1972) whose work as a student at Edinburgh College of Art had attracted Lorimer’s attention. Light streams in through a series of stained glass windows by Douglas Strachan (1875–1950), transforming the secular, non-denominational spaces into quasi-religious ones. Many of the vignettes in Strachan’s windows were particularly difficult to appreciate until photographed for this project.  Military history melds with Scottish tradition in controlled but intense emotion, and once the Memorial was opened, controversy was forgotten as the brilliance and inclusiveness of its unified scheme was recognized.

The overall effect has little of the heavy symbolism of the memorials erected two decades earlier to the dead of the South African War. It manages, very skilfully, to be entirely representational and illustrative in its character – thus rendering it approachable, unthreatening and even welcoming to those who know little of art. Yet it exemplifies the presence and dignity shown by the very best design of the 1920s. The memorial has served a continuing purpose not anticipated at the time, for it has continued to add to its roll the names of those who have fallen in subsequent wars and conflicts.   

The book is organized into two main sections: the history of the memorial ‘From Proposal to Completion via Controversy’, and its art and architecture ‘The Artists, the Building and the Decoration’. There are endnotes, bibliography and index, making this a valuable work of reference as well as a fascinating history for general reading. 

Scotland’s Shrine: The Scottish National War Memorial by Duncan Macmillan with photography by Antonia Reeve is published by Lund Humphries in association with the Trustees of The Scottish National War Memorial.192pp. 125 colour and 25 mono illus. ISBN: 9781848221567