Tuesday, 11 November 2008
Remembrance Day
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.— Lt.-Col. John McCrae
Today is Armistice Day (a.k.a. Veterans' Day in the US, Remembrance Day in the Commonwealth), marking the 90th anniversary of the end of World War I. Living as I do "in Flanders' Fields", and just having finished rereading Keegan's history of the First World War, I thought it was only appropriate to attend the ceremonies.
As for which ceremonies to attend, for me there was no better choice than that of Ypres, the scene of three of the most vicious battles of the war, and along with the Somme and Verdun, one of the "big three" battlegrounds of the Western Front (and the closest to my house).
In recognition for the many thousands who died fighting for the British Empire around Ypres, the Menin gate (one of the gates out of the city walls, chosen because most of the fallen would have walked out it on their way to the battle, never to pass back through it again) was constructed, and carries in it the names of all the fallen whose remains were never found. (In the muddy conditions and with the massive artillery barrages of World War I, in which some shells made craters 20 feet deep, there are a lot of soldiers who left no trace but their names.)
In honour of their sacrifice, the Ypres fire brigade decided to institute a perpetual memorial: every evening at 8 p.m., traffic is stopped through the gate, and buglers play the "Last Post". Today was the 27,569th playing of the Last Post, exceptionally at 11 a.m. to commemorate the Armistice. This commemoration was only interrupted when the Germans occupied Ypres during World War II—and it was resumed the very evening Ypres was liberated, even as heavy fighting continued in other parts of the city!
It was a moving ceremony and well attended. It is reassuring to see that even as the number of people left on the earth who remember World War I dwindles, the numbers of people who visit the battlefields, cemeteries and war memorials has increased in recent years.
They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them.— Laurence Binyon, "For the Fallen"
