Commonwealth War Graves - Tirana Park



Following the end of the war in Europe, an Army Graves Registration Unit entered Albania with the task of concentrating the remains of Commonwealth Servicemen, into a site chosen in the capital, Tirana. Due to the political situation in the country, this task could not be completed, though 52 sets of remains were recovered in the short time available.



Eventually, in 1955, after repeated requests to enter the country were refused, the Commission took the decision to commemorate the 38 identified casualties on special memorials erected in Phaleron War Cemetery in Greece.



This remained thus until 1994, when a change in the political situation in Albania allowed a Commission representative access for the first time. He discovered that the original individual burials had been moved by the Communist authorities to an unmarked collective grave located under a path near the university buildings in Tirana.



At the beginning of 1995, the 38 special memorials were removed from Phaleron and re-erected as close as possible to the site of the mass grave, in an area designated the Tirana Park Memorial Cemetery. In 1998, following a study of the Graves Registration unit files, it was possible for the Commission's records staff to confirm the identities of a further seven casualties previously buried in Tirana War Cemetery as unknowns. There is also 1 special memorial here, an alternative commemoration to a lost grave in Shepr, Albania.



Of interest is the red granite slab on which is mounted the years and in Albanian and English, the purpose of the monument. The slab formerly covered the grave of Enver Hoxha, former leader of Albania when he was buried in a place of honor in Martyrs' Cemetery (Varrezat e Deshmoreve). In 1991 he fell from grace and was moved to an unmarked grave in another cemetery. His marker was reused in the Commonwealth memorial.