commemoration – Page 2 – The NEN

“The lamps are going out all over Europe, we shall not see them lit again in our life-time”

“It was seeing the picture of Kitchener and his finger pointing at you – any position that you took up the finger was always pointing at you – it was a wonderful poster really.

I was always a tall and fairly fit lad. When I confronted the recruiting officer he said that I was too young, although I had said that I was eighteen years of age. He said: “Well, I think you are too young , son. Come back in another year or so.’

I returned home and never said anything to my parents. I picked up my bowler hat, which my mother had bought me and which was only to wear on Sundays, and I donned that thinking it would make me look older.

I presented myself to the recruiting officer again, and this time there was no queries. I was accepted. My mother was very hurt when I arrived home that night and told her that I had to report to Mill Hill next morning. I was 16 in the June.”

Private Thomas McIndoe

12 Batallion, Middlesex Regiment

Unknown Soldier: just one week left

Who said the art of letter writing was dead? LETTER TO AN UNKNOWN SOLDIER has turned out to be a huge success, and more than 16,000 people have contributed so far to this new kind of war memorial. Letters have poured in from all over the UK and beyond, each one expressing a different opinion, some deeply personal, others political, some loving and tender, others full of anger.

We’ve had letters from school children and politicians, midwives and teachers, published writers and servicemen and women. This week’s letters include one from the former Home Secretary and postman Alan Johnson, one about the experience of Sikh soldiers in the trenches and hundreds of letters from students around the country, including an absolute gem from 11 year old Craig Hayden Rankin from Rosebank Primary School in Nairn, Scotland.

A week today, the project will come to an end. Will you help us make it an even bigger success? Please, share this link and ask your friends and colleagues to write their own letter too. Our twitter name is @letter1418 and on facebook you can find us at Facebook.com/letter1418. Who knows, maybe we can reach 20,000 letters with your help!

1418now.org.uk/letter

Tickets available for WW1 commemoration event

One thousand free places to attend Scotland’s Drumhead Service

A thousand free places will be made available from today for those who wish to attend Scotland’s national commemoration marking the centenary of the outbreak of the First World War next month.

Signalling the start of the five-year Scottish Commemorations Programme, a Drumhead Service will be held at Edinburgh Castle on August 10 before a congregation of almost 9,000 people from all parts of Scotland.

The multi-faith service on the castle esplanade will replicate those held on the front line 100 years ago when, in a long-held military tradition, neatly piled drums with draped Colours were used in place of an altar.

Thousands of seats have already been allocated by Scotland’s 32 local authorities to people in all parts of Scotland. Representatives of the armed services, veterans groups, charities and civic leaders across Scotland have also been invited.

From 0900 today (Tuesday) the Scottish Commemorations Panel will make a thousand places available to those who have not already secured tickets through their local authority or been invited by other means.

The August 10 event will mark the start of the Scottish Commemorations Programme which will remember eight particular events from World War One that had a significant impact on Scotland. They include the start and end of the war, major battles including Gallipoli, Loos, Jutland and Arras and domestic incidents such as the Quintinshill rail disaster and the loss of HMY Iolaire.

Following the ticket-only Drumhead Service, military bands and guards from the three services will parade down the Royal Mile. The congregation will be invited to follow in a procession to Holyrood Park, where they will find a replica Commonwealth War Graves cemetery. Those gathered in the park will have the opportunity to leave poppies and other markers.

The day’s events have been designed to give a sense of what it might have been like to enlist during the first few weeks and months of the war. The Drumhead Service represents the moment before deployment; the procession, a ‘March as to War’ and the gathering in Holyrood Park, the approach to the front and assembly for military action. The memorial of over 100 headstones will provide a vital sense of scale and a focus for acts of individual and collective commemoration.

Those who wish to attend the event but don’t have a ticket for the Drumhead Service are encouraged to line the Royal Mile and attend the memorial at Holyrood Park. The Drumhead Service will also be broadcast on a large screen at the base of Arthur’s Seat.

The Drumhead Service, procession and memorial will follow events happening in Glasgow as part of the UK Commemorations Programme on August 4 – the 100th anniversary of the date Britain entered the war. A Commonwealth-themed service at Glasgow Cathedral and a commemoration at the Cenotaph will be held in the city on that date.

Cabinet Secretary for Culture and External Affairs, Fiona Hyslop said: “The Drumhead Service, procession and memorial event on August 10 will be the first in a series of commemorative events between now and 2019 through which we will encourage people of all ages across Scotland to recognise the significant and broad impact the First World War had on our nation, and to reflect on its lasting social and civic legacy.

“This will be an opportunity for those from all parts of Scotland to come together to remember more than 100,000 Scots who lost their lives during the First World War, those who were left injured or disabled by the terrible conflict, and the families and communities in every city, town and village who were forced to come to terms with the terrible consequences.”

Chair of the Scottish Commemorations Panel, Norman Drummond, said: “The Scottish Commemorative Programme has three main aims: education, genealogy and legacy. We want to invite the whole of Scotland – people of all ages and in all corners of the country – to join us in remembering those who served during the First World War, to consider the significant impact the war had on Scotland and Scots around the world and to ask the question ‘What do we learn from all this?’

“Thanks to the support of local authorities, every part of Scotland will be represented at the Drumhead Service in addition to those from the military, veterans communities, charities and civic Scotland.

“By making a thousand places available to the general public we can be certain that as many people as possible, from all parts of Scotland, have an opportunity to come and commemorate this important anniversary, upon which we and our children and our grandchildren may in years to come reflect that ‘we were there and we remembered’.”

The Royal Edinburgh Military Tattoo are organising the Drumhead Service, procession and memorial event at the request of Scottish Ministers.

Brigadier David Allfrey, Producer of the Royal Edinburgh Military Tattoo, said: “A Drumhead Service is a hugely fitting start to the Scottish Commemorations Programme. It provides a proper focus for us all in our reflections on the First World War: its context, its realities, its impact and its relevance both today and into the future. On the eve of battle, each and every combatant and those that support them, tend to find time for reflection, each in their own way. In the same way, we hope the Drumhead Service, procession and memorial might help stimulate a rich conversation that, using the War as its frame, can cover a broad ground – a look forward as well as a reflection on things past.

“The day’s events have been designed to give a sense of what it must have been like to enlist for the First World War, to leave familiar surroundings of town and country, to join up with others in the austere surroundings of the barracks, to wear uniform and be expected to act and live as a group – to stylised words of command – to march, learn skill at arms, face the uncertainty of travel overseas and the brutality of war.

“Scotland’s local authorities have secured the attendance of thousands of people from across the country but we recognise there will be many more who haven’t been allocated a place and would like to join us at the Drumhead Service to reflect on the part played by their forebears, to pay tribute to the many whose lives were lost and to contemplate what we might learn for the future.

“That is why we’re making 1000 free places available from today.”

The Drumhead Service will start at 10.30 on August 10 and will last approximately half an hour. Doors open at 9.00 and the congregation should be seated by 10.00. The whole event – including the procession down the Royal Mile and memorial at Holyrood Park – is expected to last until 14.00, although the public can remain in the park until 18.00 when the memorial will be closed.

Tickets for the Drumhead Service can be requested online at www.WW100Scotland.com.

Those requiring wheelchair access or with other accessibility requirements should ring 0131 225 1188. Tickets will be allocated on a first-come first-served basis and up to ten can be requested by each applicant.

All applications must be received by 4 August 2014.

Write to the Unknown Soldier

Letter To An Unknown Soldier is a new kind of war memorial: one made only of words, and by thousands of people. And there’s still time to put pen to paper …

The project, created by Kate Pullinger and Neil Bartlett, is inspired by Charles Jagger’s famous statue in Paddington Station of a soldier reading a letter. Everyone in the UK is invited to pause, take a moment or two, and write that letter. All of the letters will be published online for everyone to read alongside contributions from 50 leading writers and held in the British Library’s web archive.

The project, run by 14-18 Now, asks as many people as possible to send a personal message to one of the men who served and was killed during World War One.

Schools and community groups, as well as individuals, have already written letters and their thoughts are part of an online exhibition. Letters are also featured from established writers including A.L Kennedy, Sheila Hancock, Andy McNab and Caryl Churchill.

It’s not too late to write your letter – the project runs until 4th August at 11pm: the centenary of the moment when Prime Minister Asquith announced to the House of Commons that Britain had joined the First World War.

For further information visit 1418now.org.uk

Produced in association with Free Word and in conjunction with the BBC

I’ve written to him:

Dear Friend

I hope I’m not being too presumptuous calling you friend – after all, we’ve never met but I feel that I’ve known you for most of my life. Let me explain.

Our paths first crossed when I was at secondary school; it must have been 1969 or 1970, which now seems such a long time ago!

It was Mr Macefield, a brilliant History teacher, who first introduced me to you and your pals. The Somme, Passchendaele, the misery, the suffering, the mud, the rats, the lice – I’ve remembered those lessons to this day.

I’ve never experienced war first hand; never felt the fear, breathed in the stench of gas and decay or cringed as shells came crashing down. I’ve never felt the grief of losing close pals. I feel dirty if I can’t shower every morning: God only knows how softies like me would have coped with the filth, the lice and the rats – but you did!

And I often wonder how I would have responded when the officer’s whistle sounded: would I have had the guts to clamber over the top and advance into an inferno of shells and withering machine gun fire? Would I have found it in me to summon up the courage to walk into Hell – you did.

I’m too old to fight now, so I’ll never know. I’ve reached middle age, something so many of you Tommies never did.

I wonder why you enlisted? Duty? Patriotic fervour? Maybe it was a sense of fair play, facing up to a bully? Or more likely you took the King’s shilling because you fancied an adventure and war offered a chance to see places you’d only ever heard about? You probably signed up because all your pals did, and you didn’t want to be left at home while they enjoyed danger and excitement abroad? Whatever your reason, I am grateful – and my generation and those that follow owe you so much.

It’s just a real pity we didn’t learn the lessons of your sacrifice: the Great War really should have been the war to end all wars, but mankind – and our so-called ‘leaders’ in particular – can be incredibly stupid. Just as they were in your day!

Society has moved forward in so many ways; you wouldn’t believe – indeed, couldn’t even begin to imagine – the advances we’ve made, but it seems we can’t stop finding reasons to fight each other. Territory, religion, ideology – you name it, we’ll go to war over it and we go on and on inventing new and ‘better’ ways to kill more and more people! Can you believe that?

But that’s not your fault. When the call came, you answered it. You did your bit; yes, for King and country but also for us. Thank you for all that you did and I’m sorry we’ve made such a mess of things. When I think of you – and the many thousands who also gave everything – I’m ashamed. We have let you down.

Botanics to create WW1 commemoration poppy field

The Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh (RBGE) will mark the centenary of the start of the First World War by creating a poppy field at the centre of its Edinburgh site. The display will commemorate the employees who went to war, many of whom lost their lives, and will also remember others who were, or still are, affected by war.

RBGE’s Regius Keeper Simon Milne MBE said: “Plant symbolism is
an important part of cultures across the globe, particularly through representing emotions and spirituality. It is therefore fitting that at the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh, the heart of Scotland’s plant heritage, we mark the anniversary of the start of World War One with a poppy field. I hope that the flowers will encourage people to reflect on the 16 million people who lost their lives and the impact that the war had on the lives of everyone.”

The poppy field, located on the Garden’s prominently-positioned Glasshouse Lawn, will be sown in May using the common poppy Papaver rhoeas, an iconic symbol of remembrance and used to commemorate the Great War since 1921. This large, four-petalled, scarlet flower can lie dormant for many years before germination which is often triggered when the soil is disturbed.

During the First World War, battlefields that were blasted and bombed created ideal conditions for it to flourish. The sight of poppies, appearing to heal the torn earth, inspired Canadian Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae to write the memorable war poem ‘In Flanders Fields’.

RBGE’s horticultural team is planning for swathes of poppies to emerge in late July to mark the centenary.

David Knott, Curator of the Living Collection, explained: “We did trials with the poppy in our nursery last year in order to try and get the timing of flowering just right to coincide with the start of the commemorations.
Once the poppies are planted, we are pretty much in the hands of the weather as to the result but we all hoping our efforts will make a fitting and timely tribute.”

At the time of the Great War, the Garden had 110 staff and of the 88 men, 73 joined the forces and 20 lost their lives in action.