Located in northern France, the Beaumont-Hamel Newfoundland Memorial can be found nine kilometres north of the town of Albert within the département of the Somme. The Beaumont-Hamel Newfoundland Memorial encompasses 30 hectares and is the largest of five Newfoundland memorial sites in France and Belgium that together form the Trail of the Caribou.
At the heart of the memorial stands a great bronze caribou (the emblem of the Royal Newfoundland Regiment). Its defiant gaze forever fixed towards its former foe, the caribou stands watch over rolling fields that still lay claim to many men with no known final resting place.
Sculptor Basil Gotto’s bronze caribou design is believed to have been inspired in part by the iconic Newfoundland photograph, “The Monarch of the Topsails”. The noble bronze caribou is the emblem of the Royal Newfoundland Regiment. The statue is estimated to weigh approximately 770 kilograms (1,700 pounds).
Landscape architect Rudolph H.K. Cochius incorporated touches from home throughout his design. The Caribou Monument sits atop a mound surrounded by rock and shrubs native to Newfoundland. More than 5,000 trees native to Newfoundland (including spruce, dogberry and juniper) were also planted along the boundaries of the site before its opening in 1925.
