We have to go back to the first quarter of
the previous century to find the events that gave rise to this ceremony of commemoration.
The First World War ended on the eleventh hour on the eleventh day on the eleventh month, 1918 in accordance with the Armistice signed by representatives of Germany and the Entente. A year later, on the anniversary of Armistice Day there was an act of two minute silence held on the grounds of Buckingham Palace in memory of the victims of the World War I. This first act would set the trend for a Day of Remembrance for
decades to come.
Nowadays, it is generally called Remembrance Day or Poppy Day. It is still a memorial day on which millions of people in Commonwealth countries stop what they are doing and observe a Two Minute Silence at 11 am on 11 November in the memory of those who have been dead or affected in all wars. There is a special silence in Trafalgar Square led by the Royal British Legion.
The red remembrance poppy has become an emblem of this Day due to “In Flanders Fields”, a poem written by Canadian physician Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae’s .
The poppies bloomed across some of the
worst battlefields of Flanders during the fight, and their brilliant red colour
became a symbol for the blood spilled in the war.
