Watching the news coverage of armistice day earlier, quite an interesting thought occurred to me: would it now be possible to find out who the unknown warrior buried in Westminster Cathedral was? These days we have pretty accurate DNA testing, so presumably it would be possible to open the tomb, take a sample probably of bone and find a bit of DNA. The identity of this anonymous soldier could then be found, and in theory his family could even be traced. A century-old mystery would then be solved. I’m sure I’m not the first person this has occurred to, and I suppose the question is, would we want to? The point of the Unknown Warrior is that he stands for all the soldiers killed in action, and finally establishing his identity would destroy that metonymic power. Solving historic mysteries is one thing, but maybe it would be better to let this one remain unsolved.