"Just pure humanity."
Once more this morning, hundreds and hundreds of people, from small children to wheelchair bound pensioners gathered on our town streets and around our Town War Memorial to remember and honour men of the town who gave their lives in two world wars. As my daughter once pointed out to me (and even though we are incomers and have no antecedents here), these are our people - the names on the memorial still appear in the school registers and voters' lists and clubs in the town. In the seventies and eighties, in our complacent post-Cold War society, Remembrance appeared to be dying out. But over the past few years here I notice more and more people taking part in or watching the ceremonies in the town, parents bringing their children to watch - you can see them bending to explain various things, to encourage their interest. And marching behind the British Legion members this morning, I could see men I know to be in their seventies and eighties drawing themselves up and falling automatically into line as the "By the left quick march" rang out.
And as we filed into the Parish Church for the first part of the ceremonies, I caught the eye of my best friend, who was sitting in the congregation at the back of the Church and we exchanged smiles. She and I met when I first moved here - she had arrived only a year or two before me - and we brought our then small toddlers to the same playgroup and became fast friends. In April this year, P's son, now 23, fulfilled his long term ambition by passing out from Sandhurst as an Officer in the British Army and he has been on training courses ever since, in various countries. He was home on leave in October. This week, he has been posted to Iraq with the rest of his regiment. So, in addition to my great-uncle, David has been very much in my mind today with heartfelt hopes for his safety and that of all the other young men still fighting in our name.
While I was in Belgium I bought a book of new photographs of the battle sites of Passchendaele commissioned by the local authorities in Belgium - some really beautiful photographs. And with each one is an extract from a contemporary document - a war journal, a medal citation, a personal diary relating to that site.
Adjoining this photograph
of a field in Passchendaele still gleaming with deep mud and with one rusting shell presumably recently ploughed up, is this extract from the personal diary of Leutnant Schafer of the Infanterie-Regiment 465 - a German Officer. He wrote
"From a small pill-box I have a good view over the battlefield. In front of me is a remarkable sight: a break in the battle to remove dead and wounded. The guns are silent, a deep peace rules over the battlefield. No plough could gouge the fields in such a manner. The chaos is awful to behold. Slowly and carefully, stretcher-bearers with dogs arrive from both sides. Friends and foe alike have their red crosses clearly displayed. Fascinated, I watch this sad task through my field glasses. What a difference; no will to hurt, no raw hatred, just pure humanity."
What makes this especially sad for me is that Leutnant Schafer was looking out on the battlefield on 26th October 1917, the very day and in the aftermath of the battle in which my great-uncle died and in which they had presumably been doing their level best to kill each other.
So many people wonder at the futility of war, regardless of rank and nationality. We do now. And even in the midst of it, thinking men on both sides it seems, wondered at it then, were struck by the contrasts in that dreadful situation.
"Just pure humanity", such poignant words from a professional soldier of WW1. We need so much more of it,
And as we filed into the Parish Church for the first part of the ceremonies, I caught the eye of my best friend, who was sitting in the congregation at the back of the Church and we exchanged smiles. She and I met when I first moved here - she had arrived only a year or two before me - and we brought our then small toddlers to the same playgroup and became fast friends. In April this year, P's son, now 23, fulfilled his long term ambition by passing out from Sandhurst as an Officer in the British Army and he has been on training courses ever since, in various countries. He was home on leave in October. This week, he has been posted to Iraq with the rest of his regiment. So, in addition to my great-uncle, David has been very much in my mind today with heartfelt hopes for his safety and that of all the other young men still fighting in our name.
While I was in Belgium I bought a book of new photographs of the battle sites of Passchendaele commissioned by the local authorities in Belgium - some really beautiful photographs. And with each one is an extract from a contemporary document - a war journal, a medal citation, a personal diary relating to that site.
Adjoining this photograph
of a field in Passchendaele still gleaming with deep mud and with one rusting shell presumably recently ploughed up, is this extract from the personal diary of Leutnant Schafer of the Infanterie-Regiment 465 - a German Officer. He wrote
"From a small pill-box I have a good view over the battlefield. In front of me is a remarkable sight: a break in the battle to remove dead and wounded. The guns are silent, a deep peace rules over the battlefield. No plough could gouge the fields in such a manner. The chaos is awful to behold. Slowly and carefully, stretcher-bearers with dogs arrive from both sides. Friends and foe alike have their red crosses clearly displayed. Fascinated, I watch this sad task through my field glasses. What a difference; no will to hurt, no raw hatred, just pure humanity."
What makes this especially sad for me is that Leutnant Schafer was looking out on the battlefield on 26th October 1917, the very day and in the aftermath of the battle in which my great-uncle died and in which they had presumably been doing their level best to kill each other.
So many people wonder at the futility of war, regardless of rank and nationality. We do now. And even in the midst of it, thinking men on both sides it seems, wondered at it then, were struck by the contrasts in that dreadful situation.
"Just pure humanity", such poignant words from a professional soldier of WW1. We need so much more of it,