Fabian Ware
Major General Sir Fabian Ware, founder in 1917 of the Imperial (now Commonwealth) War Graves Commission and its Vice-Chairman until 1948, has a memorial stone in St George's chapel in Westminster Abbey. This chapel was set up after the First World War as the Warriors Chapel until dedicated to St George in 1944. The small stone, unveiled in 1950, set in the west wall reads:
In memoriam Fabian Ware 1869-1949
He was born at Clifton near Bristol on 17th June 1869 the only son of Charles and Amy and was educated in London and Paris. He worked as a schoolmaster in England and in South Africa. His wife was Anna Phibbs and they had a son and a daughter. During the 1914-1918 war he worked for the British Red Cross in France and set up the War Graves Commission in order that the bodies of fallen soldiers from the battlefields could be re-buried in permanent cemeteries with proper headstones. In 1922 he was knighted. He was also editor of the newspaper the Morning Post. He died on 28th April 1949 and is buried at Amberley in Gloucestershire.
A service to mark the centenary of the Commonwealth War Graves Commission was held in the Abbey on 23rd May 2017.
Further reading
Oxford Dictionary of National Biography 2004
This image can be purchased from Westminster Abbey Library
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