Sarah Shepherd

The Imperial War Graves Commission in Egypt

Sarah's first book will cover the work of the Imperial War Graves Commission in Egypt. For as long as she can remember, she has always had a deep love for Egypt and its history. This led to her studying Egyptology via the University of Manchester and then onto the University of Hull, where she graduated with a Master’s in Military History in 2015.

As a veteran, the work and ethos of the War Graves Commission is something she has always supported and believed in. Egypt is the second largest area of operation for the Commission outside of the Western Front, and her book will tell the story of an Imperial Service operating in Egypt during a time of political complexity.

In her spare time, when she's not walking the world's most anti-social French Bulldog, she enjoys volunteering for the Commission, helping maintain graves and educating the public via their voluntary lecturers programme.

The Graves Registration Units

Sarah's second book will take her from the cemeteries and war graves of Egypt to the units who had the difficult task of gathering the fallen and bringing them home. After the guns of the First World War fell silent, another army went to work. The Graves Registration Units combed battlefields and isolated graves across a shattered continent, gathering the fallen so that no soldier would be left unaccounted for. Their work didn't end in 1918 — it laid the foundations for the Commonwealth War Graves Commission's mission through the Second World War and beyond.

This is the story of the men who did the quiet work of not forgetting.