Remembrance Sunday

Angel Hill Remembrance 2026

 As I looked around yesterday at the enormous crowd lining Angel Hill and the roads leading into it, I was impressed with the size of the crowd and their calm and apparently thoughtful mood. Perhaps, like me, they were thinking of WW2 if they were elderly, or of war generally, of which there is plenty around. We were all there because yesterday, November 8^th, was Remembrance Sunday, kept as a day to commemorate the contribution of British and Commonwealth military and civilian forces in the two World Wars and later conflicts. It is held on the second Sunday nearest to November 11^th, Armistice Day, the anniversary of the end of hostilities in WW1 in 1918.

Honouring fallen heroes.

It is marked by ceremonies at local war memorials in most cities, towns and villages, attended by civic dignitaries, ex-servicemen and women; members of the local armed forces, both regular and reserve; military cadet forces and youth organisations such as the Boy Scouts, Girl Guides, Boys’ Brigade and Girls’ Brigade; all are involved as are representatives of the Judiciary. Two minutes’ silence is observed and church bells, usually muffled, add a sombre, mournful note.

Remembrance Service in Bury Cathedral

The focus of remembrance for the dead of WW1 originally fell on Armistice Day itself, commencing in 1919 when National Service events were staged at town and village war memorials, often featuring processions of civic dignitaries and military veterans. The first UK commemoration of the end of WW1 took place at Buckingham Palace with King Georg V hosting a “Banquet in honour of the President of the French Republic” in the evening of November 10, 1919.  The first official Armistice Day events were subsequently held in the grounds of the Palace on the morning of 11^th November 1919, and this included a two minutes’ silence at 11.00 a.m. as a mark of respect for those who died in the war and for those left behind. While the initial public reaction when the Armistice was signed on Nov 11^th, 1918, was jubilation and celebration, the 1919 banquet was criticized as being too celebratory.

In the following year, Armistice Day in 1920, the funeral of The Unknown Soldier took place at the London Cenotaph; buses were halted; electricity was cut to tramlines and even trading on the London S

1945 poster.

tock Exchange was stopped. A two-minute silence was observed throughout the nation. Starting in 1921, the Royal British Legion began selling Remembrance poppies to raise funds for ex-servicemen. Throughout the 1920s and 1930s, the character of remembrance became more politicised; for some, Armistice Day was a day for recognizing the horrors of war, never to be repeated; for others the day symbolized the honour of military service.

Both the elderly who remember WW2 and youngsters
who are learning about the Armistice commemoration.

Peace and pacifism occupied much of public discussion during the Thirties, unsurprising following a brutal world war which had left record numbers of dead and wounded. A Christian-Pacifist M.P. was elected to Parliament in 1923 and by the mid-1930s the Peace Pledge Union was gaining wide support. In 1933 an Oxford University Union debate aroused great interest and the student body voted for a resolution that “this House will in no circumstances fight for King and Country.” In the same year the Co-operative Women’s Guild sold white poppies in remembrance. During WW2, the commemoration continued though the celebrations were moved to the Sunday preceding November 11^th as an emergency measure to avoid disruption to the week-day factory production of vital war materials.

In May 1945, just before VE day [Victory in Europe day] the new government began consultation with the British Legion on the future of Remembrance. In fact, Armistice Day happened to fall on a Sunday

V.E. DAY IN 1945.

that year, avoiding the need to change wartime practice. One strand of thought held that to continue with the November 11 date would seem to focus more on WW1 and, by implication, downplay the importance of WW2. Other dates were suggested: May 8 [VE Day]; June 6, [D-Day]; August 15 [VJ Day]; September 3 [outbreak of WW2]; even June 15^th [the signing of the Magna Carta in [1215] Finally, the Archbishop of Westminster proposed that the second Sunday in November should be named Remembrance Sunday in commemoration of both world wars and this suggestion was endorsed by the Home Office in January 1946, with the Prime Minister, Clement Attlee announcing in the House of Commons in June of that year, that “the Government felt that this view would commend itself to all.”

 

Two small girls joining in the celebrations, in the midst
of the rubble of a bombed building in Battersea.

Sailors with their girlfriends celebrating The Day

Let's all go down The Strand.
V.E.Day 1945.

Abbreviations and Dates.

VE Day   Victory in Europe Day May 8^th.

D-Day - A Military codename for Operation Overlord, the Normandy invasion, the largest seaborne invasion in history, June 6^th, 1944.                    

VJ Day   Victory in Japan Day August 15^th.

3^rd September 1939     Declaration of the beginning of the Second World War.

1215   The signing of the Magna Carta.  June 15th.