SENIOR United Nations officials and other international leaders have paid moving tributes to the Ellesmere-born social reformer Eglantyne Jebb as a compassionate champion of children’s rights.

Members of the Jebb family travelled to Geneva to take part in a special service on Wednesday which saw her remains transferred from a local municipal cemetery to a more prestigious resting place, the Cimetière des Rois – known as the Cemetery of Kings – which is reserved for leading figures who have played a significant part in the city’s history.

This year marks the centenary of the Geneva Declaration of the Rights of the Child, a ground-breaking document drafted by Eglantyne and adopted by the League of Nations in 1924, five years after she launched Save the Children with her younger sister, Dorothy Buxton at the end of the First World War.

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Family members at the graveside service included Eglantyne’s great-great nephew, Richard Jebb, who lives at The Lyth country house on the outskirts of Ellesmere, where she was born in 1876.

He said: “As a family we are understandably proud of her achievements and very grateful to the city of Geneva for honouring her in this way as a humanitarian of international standing, worthy of inclusion in the Cimitiere des Rois alongside other significant figures in the history of the city.

“Eglantyne was a very modest person and would probably have felt that the ceremony was all rather a fuss about nothing, but the fact remains that the document she drafted in Geneva and which was ratified by the League of Nations in 1924 was the first piece of international law that recognised specifically that children had rights.”

The service – covered extensively by Swiss television, radio and newspapers – included a eulogy by United Nations human rights official Laura Dolci.

Speaking on behalf of Volker Turk, the UN’s Human Rights Commissioner, she said: “Over the past decades, the world has taken considerable steps in children’s rights.

Border Counties Advertizer: Eglantyne’s great-great nephew, Richard Jebb, with his wife, Professor Susan Jebb, their son, Felix and historian Clare Mulley, author of Eglantyne’s award-winning biography The Woman who Saved the Children.Eglantyne’s great-great nephew, Richard Jebb, with his wife, Professor Susan Jebb, their son, Felix and historian Clare Mulley, author of Eglantyne’s award-winning biography The Woman who Saved the Children. (Image: The Jebb Family.)

“I pay tribute to Eglantyne Jebb for spearheading this progress

“Save the Children, the organisation she founded and built, is today one of the world’s leading voices on the rights of the child.

“We cannot underestimate the key role that Eglantyne Jebb played in Geneva in the early 1920s in promoting children's rights and their universality.

“As we honour her life today, we remain inspired — and bound — by her commitment to build a world where all children, no matter where they live, go to school, are healthy and are safe from harm.”

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Eglantyne’s coffin was buried next to the grave of the former UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Sergio Vieira de Mello, who was tragically killed in a bombing in Iraq that took his life and the lives of 21 human rights colleagues in 2003.

Nearby are the remains of 350 other notable figures, including the Protestant reformer John Calvin, the British scientist, Humphry Davey and the president of the Red Cross, Max van Berchem.

Michel Anglade, director of Save the Children’s office in Geneva, added: “We are proud and humbled to join members of Eglantyne’s family and leading child rights defenders to acknowledge the legacy and impact of this incredible woman.”