More than 1,700 Black South African servicemen who died in non-combat roles on the Allied side during World War I and have no known grave have been recognized with a memorial more than a century later.

Hundreds of South African soldiers, mostly black, who died during World War One have been honoured in Cape Town with a new memorial. After the war, they were not recognized because of British colonialism's racial policies and then South Africa's apartheid regime.

Many of those killed in the First World War had gone unacknowledged with bereaved relatives given little or no information about their fate

Hundreds of South African servicemen, mostly black, who died during World War One have been honoured with a new memorial in Cape Town after going unrecognised for more than a century. The 1,772 men worked in dangerous and gruelling non-combatant roles in East Africa but until now, they had no known grave or commemoration.

Cape Town honors 1,772 Black South African servicemen who died in World War I without known graves. A new memorial preserves their legacy.

Britain's Princess Anne, the President of the Commonwealth War Graves Commission, walks in between an African "iroko" hardwood post bearing names and the date of death of 1,700 Black South

A memorial in Cape Town recognises 1,772 Black South African servicemen who died in non-combat roles during WWI, preserving their legacies.

Princess Anne, President of the Commonwealth War Graves Commission (CWGC), on Wednesday officially unveiled the CWGC Labour Corps Memorial in Cape Town to commemorate the contribution of more than 1 700 non-combatants who died while participating in Britain’s First World War effort in Africa.