In England we call it Poppy Day. People sell poppies that we wear on our lapel and the proceeds go to help the service men and women. Each year around Memorial Day, Veterans of Foreign Wars members and American Legion Auxiliary volunteers distribute millions of bright red poppies in exchange for contributions to assist disabled and hospitalized veterans.
The First Two Minute Silence in London (11 November 1919) was reported in the Manchester Guardian on 12 November 1919:
"The first stroke of eleven produced a magical effect. The tram cars glided into stillness, motors ceased to cough and fume, and stopped dead, and the mighty-limbed dray horses hunched back upon their loads and stopped also, seeming to do it of their own volition. Someone took off his hat, and with a nervous hesitancy the rest of the men bowed their heads also. Here and there an old soldier could be detected slipping unconsciously into the posture of 'attention'. An elderly woman, not far away, wiped her eyes, and the man beside her looked white and stern. Everyone stood very still ... The hush deepened. It had spread over the whole city and become so pronounced as to impress one with a sense of audibility. It was a silence which was almost pain ... And the spirit of memory brooded over it all"
My Uncle Bill was killed at Dunkirk and he now lays in a grave in France, I never knew him and his oldest daughter never met her Dad. My Father was a prisoner in Japan. When Singapore fell,he and his cousin and brother in law were taken and spent the rest of their war years in Japanese labour camps. It effected the rest of their lives due to ill health and a bug they picked up there. They were the lucky ones who came home.
The poppy was chosen because of this poem, and because the fact that poppies grew in those fields of battle. A perfect symbol for the blood that was shed. Not only in our modern times really but from Agincourt to World War Two English blood has been spilled in those fields in France.
We must not forget either that the war often comes home to us. In World War 11 the Royal Family did their part along with everyone else. The Queen Mum went to cheer on the people of London. She could have sat safe up in Scotland at Balmoral or some other place out of the way but she staid. She stood with the rest of London and was almost happy when a bomb fell on the palace, she said that now she felt she could face the people of London. Princess Elizabeth served as an engineer mending the trucks and driving them.
All nations have lost their sons, fathers, family to war one way or other.SO to the old men who bring about the situations that cause war, who use these young men for cannon fodder without conscience.............when we think of starting a war.........THINK AGAIN.
Remember 11-11-11-11 ..................two minutes of silence and reflect.
My Uncle Bill was killed at Dunkirk and he now lays in a grave in France, I never knew him and his oldest daughter never met her Dad. My Father was a prisoner in Japan. When Singapore fell,he and his cousin and brother in law were taken and spent the rest of their war years in Japanese labour camps. It effected the rest of their lives due to ill health and a bug they picked up there. They were the lucky ones who came home.
The poppy was chosen because of this poem, and because the fact that poppies grew in those fields of battle. A perfect symbol for the blood that was shed. Not only in our modern times really but from Agincourt to World War Two English blood has been spilled in those fields in France.
We must not forget either that the war often comes home to us. In World War 11 the Royal Family did their part along with everyone else. The Queen Mum went to cheer on the people of London. She could have sat safe up in Scotland at Balmoral or some other place out of the way but she staid. She stood with the rest of London and was almost happy when a bomb fell on the palace, she said that now she felt she could face the people of London. Princess Elizabeth served as an engineer mending the trucks and driving them.
All nations have lost their sons, fathers, family to war one way or other.SO to the old men who bring about the situations that cause war, who use these young men for cannon fodder without conscience.............when we think of starting a war.........THINK AGAIN.
Remember 11-11-11-11 ..................two minutes of silence and reflect.
3 comments:
Great tribute! We where poppies in Canada too ;o)
where is wear, sorry!
Lovely post.
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