As
to the manor born, the band was playing "Sons of the Brave."
Drafts, I remember, used to march to it on the way to the station, and
the front. This little squad marched to it, overcoats flapping, arms
swinging, their marching would not have earned the unreserved approval
of a drill sergeant, but they were volunteers all nine of them.
"Sons
of the Brave" - The march revives many memories, they were at Mons,
they were at Dunkirk, they were in Coventry, Plymouth and London, and
some of them were in Belsen. Listening to the music and the tramp of
marching feet, it is not perhaps singular that my mind jumped forward to
the coming week-end, - Remembrance Day and Remembrance Sunday - and then
slid back again to many similar days down a long chain of years. Bands
played on those days, too; sad, solemn music, Men marched the Slow
March. I recall vividly the scene soon after the First World War, when
the approaches to a local war memorial, when the war to end wars had
become a memory, were jammed with a great, grave crowd, packed body
tight, swathed in silence. And I remembered that, years later, the crowd
had dwindled; that watches seemed to be consulted during prayers and it
appeared somehow that thoughts of a meal and a fire were mixed up with
words, "At the going down of the sun and in the morning we will
remember them." I may have been wrong but that was the impression I
sensed again on Sunday what I had felt at the war memorial in the late
thirties when the war to end wars had become a memory, and the words a
mockery, and I remembered how, one morning after the sacrifice of
Czechoslavia on the alter of "Peace in our Time," an old
soldier of Mons coughed, and wiped his eye, and said "They’ve
given it all away; They’ve forgotten what it cost; The lads have died
for nothing,"
After
that, we learned a lot about the war to end wars and the annual service
at the war memorial took on a new aspect. It became a prayer for the
sons of the men who fought the war to end wars, and at that time we
could see clearly; the scales dropped from our eyes. We saw that
Remembrance-Tide was not only time for a copper and a Poppy and a pious
platitude, even heartfelt gratitude was not enough. No, if God would
only give us another chance, we would make Remembrance Day a day for
renewal of our determination to keep faith with those who died, and to
guard what their sacrifice had given us,
We
do not need the parsons to tell us that. The bombers overhead were
saying it every day. They did not speak in vain. Our resolve was high.
The greatest of sacrifices were demanded, and made, the eyes and the
administration of the whole world were upon us.
What
has happened since, to change all that? The world has not changed, our
bond with the men who must be remembered remains. Have we honoured it?
By word, yes, yet there were nine men, in civilian clothes passing by.
Oh. I know there were between 40 and 50 of them on the books, all
volunteers - by now, there may be more, but there are 20,000 people in
Pontefract. The band was rounding the Town Hall by the time I emerged
from the past, the overcoats had dressed by the left, and wavered as
recruits do when they try to march straight. At "eyes left"
the Mayor put on his hat and the nine men passed out of sight into
history. Nine men for Remembrance and tomorrow is Remembrance Day. Article
By ‘Sotto Voce’
