Strassburger memorial

[2] On 8 September, the mayors of Bern Otto von Büren, and Zürich, Dr. Melchior Römer went to Strasbourg with the support of the Swiss Federal Council.

[4] After about twenty years after the war, the Alsatian Baron Gilbert Hervé-Gruyer, who had settled to Montpellier, asked the Federal Council for the permission to build a memorial in order to commemorate the relief effort.

[2] Baron Hervé-Gruyer managed to compel the sculptor Bartholdi for his project and Carrara marble was chosen as the stone for the monument.

[5] The sculpture depicts the spirit of Strasbourg (left) who hands over the war-ravaged city (center) to the care of Helvetia (right).

[7] The erected monument could be inaugurated on 20 October 1895 at his current location near the main train station in Basel.