It is an imposing bronze monument dedicated to Chinese workers who passed through the Nolette camp, hamlet of Noyelles-sur-Mer (Somme), which will be inaugurated on the Place de Nolette this February 4.
It represents a character holding a crosspiece, another picking and a last carrying a stretcher.
Highly symbolic, it recalls that the French and English governments had signed an agreement in 1916 for the recruitment of these civilian volunteers behind the front.
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Arriving by boat, sometimes after three months of crossing, 10,000 to 12,000 would have passed through this 40 hectare camp with canvas and wooden barracks, surrounded by barbed wire.
It could accommodate up to 3,000 workers.
Volunteers, they all had a five-year English employment contract.
They were paid one franc per day according to the work done.
Seven days a week, ten hours of work per day, except Chinese New Year's Day.
In April, during Qingming, the equivalent of All Saints' Day in China, their memory is honored in Nolette.
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