Remembrance Day Explained for Children

Have you had a child ask you about Remembrance Day recently?  I have, and although I know the basics, I wanted to give a full reflection of what it is about.  So I turned to the internet in search of a child friendly explanation of what the day is about and how it came to be, and I must say I really struggled to find an appropriate account.  So if you are in the same position maybe this would help.

Remembrance Day is also known as Armistice Day, and is commemorated every year on 11^th November, to mark the armistice signed between the Allies of World War I and Germany.  An armistice is a formal agreement between warring sides to stop fighting. 

World War I started in 1914 and ended in 1918, and this year marks 100 years since the start of the war.

Each year, at 11am on 11^th November, the country holds a two minute silence as a mark of respect and remembrance for all soldiers who lost their lives through war.  The tradition of the silence was introduced four days before the first anniversary of World War I by King George V, when he announced that a two minute would be observed.

Remembrance Sunday, is a day to remember British and Commonwealth soldiers who died during the two World Wars and all wars after these.  Remembrance Sunday is held on the second Sunday in November, and ceremonies are held at local war memorials in most cities and towns where wreaths of remembrance poppies are laid on the memorials and a two minute silence is held.

A national ceremony is held on Remembrance Sunday at a war memorial in London called The Cenotaph.  During this ceremony poppy wreaths are laid by the British Royal family along with the Prime Minister and leaders of other major political parties, the Foreign Secretary, the Commonwealth High Commissioner and representatives from the Army, Navy and the Air Force.  The two minute silence at this ceremony begins by the firing of a field gun on Horse Guards Parade with the sound of a bugle call, and is ended with a second bugle call.

In 1921 a senior British officer called Field Marshall Douglas Haig and the Royal British Legion took the poppy emblem as a symbol of remembrance.  Known today as the Poppy Appeal, paper poppies are made in The Poppy Factory in Richmond, London, and are sold by members of the Royal British Legion.  The money raised by this appeal goes to support ex-servicemen and their families who are in need.