Remembrance Day
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Remembrance Day in the UK
In London Queen Elizabeth,Prince Charles and other members of the Royal Family and leaders of the political parties, attend the ceremony at The Cenotaph in Whitehall, where there is a two minutes silence at 11am, followed by the laying of wreaths. A short religious service then follows and after the playing of The Last Post by a lone bugler and the National Anthem, the Queen leaves. A member of the Royal Family takes the salute as the war veterans parade past, finishing at Horseguards Parade
On 11 November 2008, it was ninety years since the Armistice was signed, bringing an end to World War I, which came into force on the 11th hour of the 11month, 1918. Remembrance Day was dedicated by King George V, on 7 November 1919, so that every year members of the armed forces who were killed during war would be commemorated. Subsequently, all members of the Armed Services who have died on active service are included.
The Cenotaph, Whitehall, London
Setting for the Remembrance Day Service led by The Queen
The Queen has laid her wreath at the Cenotaph on Remembrance Sunday every year of her reign, except in 1959, 1961, 1963, 1968, 1983 and 1999 when she was either pregnant or overseas on an official visit.
Remembrance Day news
New items about The Queen on Remembrance Day
- Be my valentine: A lonely war bride was sent words that lasted forever
- After years in the European war theater, weary men disembarked from the Queen Mary and kissed the ground. Tears streamed down their faces. My own tears fell over the railing on Pier 88 into the river. I saw a soldier wipe tears on his sleeve, ...
- New life for the city of the dead
- ... whose burial was the first at Springvale on March 20, 1902, a year after the cemetery was laid out in the shape of the Union Jack in a show of patriotism for Federation and the death that year of Queen Victoria. The entrance to the war cemetery.
- Balochistan: West and human rights
- America is using Balochistan to pressurize Islamabad to continue drama of so-called war against terrorism (SWAT), open NATO supply route and keep using military installations of Pakistan. It has already cost Pakistani public $100bn (China Daily), ...
- Whitney Houston, dead at 48, will be remembered at Grammy's
- By NEKESA MUMBI MOODY AP Music Writer February 11, 2012 7:20PM LOS ANGELES ? Whitney Houston, who ruled as pop music's queen until her majestic voice was ravaged by drug use and her regal image was ruined by erratic behavior and a tumultuous marriage ...
Queen Elizabeth II
The Queen has led the Remembrance Day Service for every year of her reign, except six
Veterans Day
11 November
Veterans Day - Honoring All Who Served by starwolf
In the USA, 11 November was formerly known as Armistice Day. However, the name was changed after the end of World War II.
The Poppy
symbol of Remembrance Day
In late 1914, the fields of Northern France and Flanders were once again devastated as World War One raged through Europe. Once the war was over the poppy was one of the first plants to grow on the barren battlefields.
The Poppy Fields by charismaart
The significance of the poppy as a lasting memorial symbol to the fallen was realised by the Canadian surgeon John McCrae in his poem In Flanders Fields. The poppy came to represent the immeasurable sacrifice made by his comrades and quickly became a lasting memorial to those who died in World War One and later conflicts.
The Poppy was adopted by The Royal British Legion as the symbol for their Poppy Appeal, in aid of those serving in the British Armed Forces, after its formation in 1921.
In Flanders Fields
by John McCrae
In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.
We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.
Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep,
though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.
John McCrae
May 1915
Red Poppies in the Field Poster Print by Artworks
Inspiration for the poem
On 2 May, 1915, in the second week of fighting during the Second Battle of Ypres, Lieutenant Alexis Helmer was killed by a German artillery shell. He was a friend of the Canadian military doctor Major John McCrae. It is believed that John McCrae began the draft for his famous poem 'In Flanders Fields' that evening.
Wilfred Owen
A War Poet
The English Poet and Soldier Wilfred Edward Salter Owen MC (18 March 1893 - 4 November 1918) was one of the leading poets of the First World War. His poetry focussed on the horrors of trench and gas warfare was in stark contrast not only to the public perception of war at that time but also to the more patriotic verse written by war poets such as Rupert Brooke.Some of Owen's best-known works were published following his death and include Dulce Et Decorum Est, Insensibility, Anthem for Doomed Youth, Futility and Strange Meeting. His preface intended for a book of poems to be published in 1919 contains numerous well-known phrases, especially 'War, and the pity of War', and 'the Poetry is in the pity'.
Sadly, news of Owen's death was received by his family as his home town's church bells declared peace.
Source: Wikipedia
The Sentry
by Wilfred Owen
We'd found an old Boche dug-out, and he knew,
And gave us hell, for shell on frantic shell
Hammered on top, but never quite burst through.
Rain, guttering down in waterfalls of slime
Kept slush waist high, that rising hour by hour,
Choked up the steps too thick with clay to climb.
What murk of air remained stank old, and sour
With fumes of whizz-bangs, and the smell of men
Who'd lived there years, and left their curse in the den,
If not their corpses. . . .
There we herded from the blast
Of whizz-bangs, but one found our door at last.
Buffeting eyes and breath, snuffing the candles.
And thud! flump! thud! down the steep steps came thumping
And splashing in the flood, deluging muck -
The sentry's body; then his rifle, handles
Of old Boche bombs, and mud in ruck on ruck.
We dredged him up, for killed, until he whined
"O sir, my eyes - I'm blind - I'm blind, I'm blind!"
Coaxing, I held a flame against his lids
And said if he could see the least blurred light
He was not blind; in time he'd get all right.
"I can't," he sobbed. Eyeballs, huge-bulged like squids
Watch my dreams still; but I forgot him there
In posting next for duty, and sending a scout
To beg a stretcher somewhere, and floundering about
To other posts under the shrieking air.
Those other wretches, how they bled and spewed,
And one who would have drowned himself for good, -
I try not to remember these things now.
Let dread hark back for one word only: how
Half-listening to that sentry's moans and jumps,
And the wild chattering of his broken teeth,
Renewed most horribly whenever crumps
Pummelled the roof and slogged the air beneath -
Through the dense din, I say, we heard him shout
"I see your lights!" But ours had long died out.
Wilfred Owen
18 March 1893 - 04 November 1918
News about Remembrance Day
- The Holocaust was horrific, but it should not be exploited for political purposes
- It was 27 January, International Holocaust Remembrance Day, and it was the first time I had gone to the memorial in five years. I went because I wanted to reclaim a small part of myself and my history from the tornado of political and historical ...
- Survivor's appeal for bomb memorial
- A SURVIVOR of the Enniskillen bombing is leading a call for a permanent memorial to be erected on the site of the Poppy Day atrocity. Jim Dixon ? the most seriously injured person to survive the 1987 terrorist attack ? has launched an appeal for a ...
- Turkey Marks International Holocaust Remembrance Day
- January 27, 2012 Turkey Marks International Holocaust Remembrance Day Dorian Jones | Istanbul Turkey marked International Holocaust Remembrance Day by becoming the first predominantly Muslim country to screen the iconic holocaust documentary, Shoah.
- CVHS Students Wear Black, Mourn Teen Suicide
- Community members also wrote 7000 Valentine's Day cards which were delivered to the students. By Nicole Charky A student passes by a memorial on campus for Drew Ferraro. Students carried flowers and dressed in black on Tuesday in remembrance of Drew ...
Lest we forget
by Rudyard Kipling
Renaissance
God of our fathers, known of old,
Lord of our far-flung battle-line,
Beneath whose awful Hand we hold
Dominion over palm and pine
Lord God of Hosts, be with us yet,
Lest we forget lest we forget!
The tumult and the shouting dies;
The Captains and the Kings depart:
Still stands Thine ancient sacrifice,
An humble and a contrite heart.
Lord God of Hosts, be with us yet,
Lest we forget lest we forget!
Far-called, our navies melt away;
On dune and headland sinks the fire:
Lo, all our pomp of yesterday
Is one with Nineveh and Tyre!
Judge of the Nations, spare us yet,
Lest we forget lest we forget!
If, drunk with sight of power, we loose
Wild tongues that have not Thee in awe,
Such boastings as the Gentiles use,
Or lesser breeds without the Law
Lord God of Hosts, be with us yet,
Lest we forget lest we forget!
For heathen heart that puts her trust
In reeking tube and iron shard,
All valiant dust that builds on dust,
And guarding, calls not Thee to guard,
For frantic boast and foolish word
Thy mercy on Thy People, Lord!
Rudyard Kipling
The Tomb of the Unknown Warrior
Westminster Abbey, London
There are a number of versions of how the Unknown Warrior was selected, but it is generally agreed that between four and six bodies were exhumed from each of the main British battle areas on the Western Front on the night of 7 November 1920, and brought to the chapel at St Pol, in northern France. Each was covered with a Union Jack. The commander of British troops in France and Flanders, Brigadier-General LJ Wyatt, picked one. This was placed in a coffin which was taken to Boulogne, where it was transported to Dover on HMS Verdun. The other bodies were reburied.
On the morning of 11 November 1920 - the second anniversary of the armistice - the Unknown Warrior was taken by horse drawn carriage in a procession to the Cenotaph in London. This war memorial on Whitehall, designed by Edwin Lutyens, was then unveiled by King George V. At 11 o'clock there was a two minutes silence, and the body was then taken to Westminster Abbey where it was buried.
In the week after the burial an estimated 1,250,000 people visited the abbey, and the site is now one of the most visited war graves in the world. The text inscribed on the tomb: 'They buried him among the Kings, because he had done good toward God and toward his house' is from the Bible (2 Chronicles 24:16).
Royal Bridal Bouquets
Laid at the Tomb of the Unknown Warrior
Catherine Middleton at Westminster Abbey
Elizabeth Bowes Lyon, following her marriage to The Duke of York (who later became King George VI) arranged for her bridal flowers to be laid at The Tomb of the Unknown Warrior in Westminster Abbey. The gesture was made in memory of Elizabeth's brother Fergus who was killed during World War 1 in 1915.
All Royal Brides have continued the tradition ever since.
Armistice Day
11 November
Armistice Day (also known as Remembrance Day) is on November 11 and commemorates the armistice signed between the Allies of World War I and Germany at Rethondes, France, for the cessation of hostilities on the Western Front, which took effect at eleven o'clock in the morning - the "eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month". While this official date to mark the end of the war reflects the cease fire on the Western Front, hostilities continued in other regions, especially across the former Russian Empire and in parts of the old Ottoman Empire.
Read the rest of the article: Armistice Day
The Queen will attend a memorial service at Westminster Abbey, where a special flag will hang as a poingnant reminder of those who died in the First World War. A Union Flag that was used to cover the bodies of the fallen will be on display in the Abbey.
Mail online reports:
"The 'Padre's flag', as it is sometimes known, was flown daily on the Western Front and draped over makeshift altars at countless religious services including before the Battle of the Somme, when the altar was a bucket turned on end in the corner of an old trench.
But it was also used by Army chaplain Reverend David Railton to cover hundreds of those killed in action before their burial in shallow graves."
The Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, Arlington
Tomb of the Unknown Soldier
"Here Rests
In Honored Glory
An American Soldier
Known But To God"
Remembrance Day 2011
Opening of the Field of Remembrance - 10 November 2011
A member of the Royal Family will represent Queen Elizabeth II to open the Royal British Legion Field of Remembrance at Westminster Abbey on Thursday 10 November 2010 at 11 am.The Field of Remembrance will be open to visitors daily between 9.00am on Thursday 10 November, 2011 until 4.00pm on Sunday 20 November, 2011.
More information can be found at Visiting the Fields of Remembrance
Where to buy Remembrance Day Poppies
The Royal British Legion Poppy Appeal
- The Royal British Legion - The Poppy Appeal
- The Poppy Appeal raises funds for The Royal British Legion, the nation's leading Armed Forces charity providing care and support to all members of the British Armed Forces past and present and their families. Its emblem is the red poppy.
- The Royal British Legion - Remembrance
- The Fields of Remembrance
- The Royal British Legion - How you make a difference
- The Royal British Legion is the UK's leading charity providing financial, social and emotional support to millions who have served or are currently serving in the Armed Forces, and their dependants. Thanks to our supporters, we are able to provide essential services.
- The Royal British Legion - Wreaths
- Wreaths, sprays, chaplets and crosses are made at The Royal British Legion's Poppy Factory and can be ordered from The Poppy Appeal at Aylesford.
Please remember the following people on Remembrance Day
Loved ones nominated by members of the Squidoo Community
Alfred George Winter 1897-1941 My Great Uncle who was a trainee/cadet in the Royal Flying Corps in WW1 and flew byplanes over Egypt. In 1941 (WW2), he lost his life whilst laying over his wife and child to protect them, during the London Blitz.
MiMi
We owe so much to our soldiers. Here, in America, they come home to poor health care. They are changed forever, and we don't do enough to help lessen their mental anguish.
Carrie
I would like to remember my father, Ted and my partner's father, John both served in the army. Ted died when I was 16 and John died two years ago. May they rest in peace. Miss them both loads :(
Susan52
I'm remembering my son's close friend, Jeremy, killed in Iraq July 5, 2007. My son was a vehicle or two behind him, so it could have been him or any of the other Marines in that convoy. Blessings to Jeremy's family, always.
Other memorial and remembrance lenses
Plus another military event in The Queen's Diary
Remembrance Day: Taps
The Last Post
In 1928, a year after the inauguration of the Menin Gate Memorial, a number of prominent citizens in Ypres decided that some way should be found to express the gratitude of the Belgian nation towards those who had died for its freedom and independence.
The idea of the daily sounding of the Last Post - the traditional salute to the fallen warrior - was that of the Superintendant of the Ypres Police, Mr P Vandenbraambussche. The Menin Gate Memorial on the east side of Ypres was thought to be the most appropriate location for the ceremony. Originally this was the location of the old city gate leading to the Ypres Salient battlefields through which so many passed on their way to the front line.
The privilege of playing Last Post was given to buglers of the local voluntary Fire Brigade. However, the tradition has now been established around the world.
Source: Globalnet
Day is done...
Gone the sun
From the lake...
From the hills...
From the sky.
All is well...
Safely rest
God is nigh.
Fading light....
Dims the sight
And a star....
Gems the sky....
Gleaming bright
From afar....
Drawing nigh
Falls the night.
Major General Daniel Butterfield
The Last Post
Remembrance Day tribute 2008
Queen Elizabeth II broadcasts to British Troops
1 July 2009
That was then and this is now
Personal thoughts
Then came Korea, Vietnam, The Falklands Conflict. On home soil in the UK, during the 70s we learned to look under our cars if they were parked in London in case a bomb had been put underneath it.
Then there was Kuwait, followed by Iraq and Afghanistan and countless other "conflicts". More recentlky our troops have seen active service in Libya.
I know a young man who only lived because he could not sleep and had left his tent in Basra just before the rockets came in and destroyed the camp. Three of his friends died. He may have left the forces without a scratch, but he will bear the mental scars forever.
My son thought about being a Marine. If he had joined up, he would probably be in active combat now. I cannot begin to imagine what it must be like for the friends and families of our soldiers who are fighting a war that many believe should not have happened.
I pray for the safe return of your loved ones, wherever they may be.
Remembrance
Lest we forget
- Iraq war heroes.org
- Fallen American Heroes - Iraq/Afghanistan
- Honor the fallen
- Operation Iraqi Freedom and Operation Enduring Freedom casualties
Please support Operation Helmet
Supporting troops on active service
Operation Helmet is a 100% volunteer, non-partisan, charitable organization that provides helmet upgrade kits free of charge to troops in Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as to those ordered to deploy in the near future.
War Poems
Wilfred Owen
War poet poems
07 November 2010
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Who would you like us to remember on Remembrance Day?
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Jolene_Belmain
Nov 14, 2011 @ 9:43 am | delete
- Popping by your Remembrance Day lens made me remember about that day you helped me. So I would like to thank-you so much for your advice and help through the help forums.
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poddys
Nov 12, 2011 @ 3:51 am | delete
- Just came back to give this my blessing AJ. I couldn't do so last year, but I can now. I am also adding a link to it from my Brothers In Arms lens. This is such a wonderful tribute to all of those who lost their lives.
When we look at numbers like over 300 British troops killed in the Afghanistan campaign in the last few years, then compare this to over 35,000 lost on the first day of the Battle Of The Somme alone, it's staggering to think of the loss of life and how it affected the generations that came before us.
Let us not forget...
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myfairladyah
Nov 11, 2011 @ 3:42 pm | delete
- We must remember the fighters of war
For those who fought to safe our door
And those still serving on distant shore
A speedy return to home once more
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jptanabe
Nov 11, 2011 @ 11:12 am | delete
- Came back to give this beautiful lens a Blessing
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LakeshoreTara
Nov 11, 2011 @ 6:42 am | delete
- Great lens... today is Remembrance Day in Canada (November 11th)... lest we forget
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