BS: Armistice Day/Remembrance Day 2010

Subject: BS: Armistice Day 2010
From: mg
Date: 10 Nov 10 - 03:13 PM

I think each year deserves its own thread and I ask that this be monitered. mg

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day 2010
From: gnu
Date: 10 Nov 10 - 04:19 PM

In any case... lest we forget.

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day/Remembrance Day 2010
From: beardedbruce
Date: 10 Nov 10 - 07:01 PM

42nd Infantry Division

World War I
The division was activated in August 1917, drawing men from 26 states and the District of Columbia. It was composed of the 83rd Infantry Brigade (165th and 166th Infantry Regiments) and the 84th Infantry Brigade (167th and 168th Infantry Regiments). It went overseas in November 1917. The division took part in four major Operations: the Champagne-Marne, the Aisne-Marne, the Battle of Saint-Mihiel, and the Meuse-Argonne Offensive. In total, it saw 264 days of combat. While in France, the division was placed under French control for a time, commanded by various French generals including Henri Gouraud.

Casualties: Total 14,683 (KIA-2,058; WIA-12,625).

My father's father was one of the WIA - and one of the 13 survivors of his unit after one attack. It took 3 days for him to be recovered, and 2 years before he was able leave the hospital.

Always remember...

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day/Remembrance Day 2010
From: maeve
Date: 11 Nov 10 - 04:16 AM

"The memories don't leave you"

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day/Remembrance Day 2010
From: GUEST,Patsy
Date: 11 Nov 10 - 05:02 AM

Just thoughts to the bereaved families everywhere and to their sons/daughters who sacrificed their lives. We must never forget.

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day/Remembrance Day 2010
From: Lizzie Cornish 1
Date: 11 Nov 10 - 05:18 AM

Thanks for this thread, mg.

For my dear, gentle father who went to war against every emotion in his heart, because he knew that there are times when there is no alternative but to fight evil in this way.   He never really recovered from it...never spoke about the war, save for a few sentences...and valued his Peace Rose which he planted just outside the lounge window, very highly, giving it much love and attention...and probably remembering many of his friends and comrades as he did so.

For Dad, and all those who suffered on our behalf to build a better world. We owe them so very much.

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day/Remembrance Day 2010
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 11 Nov 10 - 05:34 AM

Tonight I found a bit more info about my grandmother's brother who died in 1917. I knew he & his unmarried brothers enlisted very soon after war was declared (4th August 1914) & fought at Gallipoli & on the Western front.

The Australia War Museum site contains information about everyone who served in Boer War to the wars of the mid 20th Century.

I found his regiment's Embarkation notice with date of embarkation (18th October 1914) - probably from the wharf down the road & around the corner from me as many troop ships used it.

His Date of Joining is blank but as everyone else on the page joined between 12-28 August I assume he & the few others with blank entries joined around the same time.

He was 20 years old & the men on the page ranged in age from 19 to 38 with most in their 20s & all were single. They came from Sydney & it's suburbs, & country towns, their occupations ranged from clerks, to farm workers, they were tradesman & unskilled. Most Next of Kin were Australian, some were British. One Labourer who lived in the People's palace, a Salvation Army hotel, had no next of kin.

Several month ago I sent a photograph of him to the museum as they are trying to collect photos of all service people who died in action.

James Royal Lambert

sandra

a musical note -

Eric Bogle's great song "And the band Played Waltzing Matilda " contains the line "they gave him a tin hat & they gave him a gun"

This is artistic licence - tin hats were not worn at Gallipoli. Australian troops didn't get hard hats until they went to France.

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day/Remembrance Day 2010
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 11 Nov 10 - 07:14 AM

"Remember Them?" - http://walkaboutsverse.webs.com/#212

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day/Remembrance Day 2010
From: 3refs
Date: 11 Nov 10 - 08:22 AM

For The Fallen

With proud thanksgiving, a mother for her children,
England mourns for her dead across the sea.
Flesh of her flesh they were, spirit of her spirit,
Fallen in the cause of the free.

Solemn the drums thrill; Death august and royal
Sings sorrow up into immortal spheres,
There is music in the midst of desolation
And a glory that shines upon our tears.

They went with songs to the battle, they were young,
Straight of limb, true of eye, steady and aglow.
They were staunch to the end against odds uncounted;
They fell with their faces to the foe.

They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:
Age shall not weary them, nor the years contemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them.

They mingle not with their laughing comrades again;
They sit no more at familiar tables of home;
They have no lot in our labour of the day-time;
They sleep beyond England's foam.

But where our desires are and our hopes profound,
Felt as a well-spring that is hidden from sight,
To the innermost heart of their own land they are known
As the stars are known to the Night;

As the stars that shall be bright when we are dust,
Moving in marches upon the heavenly plain;
As the stars that are starry in the time of our darkness,
To the end, to the end, they remain.

Lest We Forget!

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day/Remembrance Day 2010
From: Pistachio
Date: 11 Nov 10 - 08:43 AM

Thank you for this thread.

We Will Remember Them

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day/Remembrance Day 2010
From: GUEST,Silas
Date: 11 Nov 10 - 09:00 AM

Hi Sandra

May reccomend your reading 'Somme Mud' by Eric (I think) Lynch. He was an Australian soldier in the great war - it may help you get an idea of what it was like for him.

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day/Remembrance Day 2010
From: jacqui.c
Date: 11 Nov 10 - 09:30 AM

Remembering those that came home but were affected either physically or mentally by their own particular war.

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day/Remembrance Day 2010
From: GUEST,mg
Date: 11 Nov 10 - 10:44 AM

I remember coming across a Korean POW distant relative...Cahalan was his last name...first might have been Daniel as so many were called Daniel...he somehow was returned to USA but I don't know if it was dead or alive...for all the POWs...it is beyond comprehension what they suffered. mg

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day/Remembrance Day 2010
From: GUEST,bankley
Date: 11 Nov 10 - 11:05 AM

I was in Germany a few years back around this time of the year... talking to a friend from there I asked if they had a Remembrance day there for their fallen as well.... he said "No, we're trying to forget"

I guess that's what happens when you lose 2 in a row....

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day/Remembrance Day 2010
From: GUEST,mg
Date: 11 Nov 10 - 11:18 AM

They won't heal unless they are able to remember, and we must not stand in their way. See remembrance day song thread and click on Ich Hatt Einen Comaraden and see if ou can't pass on to your friend, although I am sure he must know the song.

The other people we must allow to remember their dead are the families of Confederate soldiers in USA. And their are undoubtedly others... mg

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day/Remembrance Day 2010
From: Jack the Sailor
Date: 11 Nov 10 - 11:21 AM

When I was going to school every day we would look at a picture of a lady you all know and sing "God Save The Queen". On November 11 each year they would tell us how most of the members of the Royal Newfoundland Regiment were sacrificed for the greater good. How they sprang up out of trenches and were cut down by machine guns for temporary control of a few hundred yards of land. They read the poem about the mustard gas. And the one about the poppy's, row on row. Then we had a minute of silence at 11:11 AM. that minute felt like a very cold and lonely hour.

Even after being in the US for 12 years, I still have poppies and I still where one once in a while.

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day/Remembrance Day 2010
From: John on the Sunset Coast
Date: 11 Nov 10 - 11:26 AM

Here in the States we now call it Veterans' Day. I call it my birthday.

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day/Remembrance Day 2010
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 11 Nov 10 - 11:50 AM

My mother's dad was an ambulance (such as they were) driver in WW1 and lived until the 1950s. I have no information about my father's dad who also died in the 1950s. My grandmothers never spoke of those times.

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day/Remembrance Day 2010
From: Mrrzy
Date: 11 Nov 10 - 12:01 PM

Happy birthday, JotSC!

I still call it armistice day. Remember, the end of war is worth fighting for.

Thank you all for your services.

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day/Remembrance Day 2010
From: Rapparee
Date: 11 Nov 10 - 01:09 PM

The Blackhawk War, 1832.
The Mexican War, 1846-1848.
The US Civil War, 1861-1865.
The Indian Wars, 1862-1890.
The Spanish-American War, 1898.
Pershing's Expedition To The Mexican Border, 1915.
World War I, 1917-1918.
World War II, 1941-1945.
The Korean War, 1950-1953.
Lebanon, 1956.
The Vietnam War, 1962-1975.
The Second Korean War (DMZ War), 1967-1970.
Grenada, 1983.
Gulf I, 1990-1991.
Bosnia, 1996.
Afghanistan, 2001-
Iraq, 2001-

To think that my ancestors came to the US to avoid the draft in Hanover! Just in time for the Blackhawk War and we haven't missed one since -- see the list above, which is just times when members of my family, men and women, was shot at. The medals don't replace the lost youth, the lost friends, the lost innocence.

"...for young Willy McBride it all happened again,
And again and again and again and again."

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day/Remembrance Day 2010
From: Jack the Sailor
Date: 11 Nov 10 - 01:19 PM

You had relatives that were shot at in Grenada?

That sounds like an interesting story.

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day/Remembrance Day 2010
From: Rapparee
Date: 11 Nov 10 - 01:30 PM

One of the first in -- got in a firefight with a couple guys with AK-47s who then gave up.

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day/Remembrance Day 2010
From: Ed T
Date: 11 Nov 10 - 01:48 PM

My deceased father signed up in the army for WW1, but was injured on route to conflict in the Halifax Explosion, December 6, 1917. It was the world's largest man-made explosion before Hiroshima.

My mother, now 97 and still healthy, participates in Remembrance Day events each year.

My son entered two-year naval officer training yesterday (he graduated from University in May).

My highest regards to all who served their country in the services, (from all countries), and to those who do so today. My best thoughts are with them.

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day/Remembrance Day 2010
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 11 Nov 10 - 04:54 PM

Silas - thanks for the reference, I'll look ro it.

I've seen many pics of the French battlefields in the past few years. I've also seen the army records of several of my grandmother's brothers. They included medical records - wounds & Trench foot, which was an extreme form of tinia (to trivialise it) cause - living in water fro days/weeks/months. Treatment took weeks/month & soldiers could be charged for getting it - they didn't keep their boots in good condition & their feet dry! A regulation no doubt written by someone in Head Office.

sandra

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day/Remembrance Day 2010
From: Rapparee
Date: 11 Nov 10 - 07:55 PM

During the Namtime, my brother got a 2nd LT who was strictly West Point, obnoxiously (and dangerously) so to troops in combat. So, to his great delight, they started saluting him. After a couple of hours of this the company CO called the LT aside and told him to lighten up -- because the men were marking him as an officer and hence as a target for a sniper. The guy turned pale and lightened up; word went around not to salute him just like other officers weren't saluted.

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day/Remembrance Day 2010
From: MikeL2
Date: 12 Nov 10 - 07:00 AM

hi

Thanks for this thread.

My wife and I are both from military families. We both take thanks that we never lost any loved ones in any of the wars. We are truly lucky.

Yesterday my wife and I went out to join our community in paying our respects to the far too many fallen.

As it happens there was a march-past by the, newly returned from Afghanistan, Mercian Regiment which is a regiment formed by the ammalgamation of regiments from the Northwest and North Midlands regiments.

500 men marched past to pay there respects to the fallen in the previous wars and to the 12 brave men who were killed in their recent actions in Afghanistan.

As we watched were were hit very emotionally by the sight of these young boys...yes they ARE boys who are fighting to keep their country - our country - safe.

With moistened eyes and lumps in our throats we clapped and waved to these heroes- because that is what they are.

And to the fallen   WE WILL REMEMBER THEM.

Respectfully

MikeL2