King Charles leads particularly poignant Remembrance Sunday service: The Yorkshire Post says
Not only was the ceremony the first time that King Charles has attended the event as head of state following the Queen’s death earlier this year, 2022 also marks the 40th anniversary of the Falklands War.
Equally, the war in Ukraine sparked by the Russian invasion earlier this year was on many minds as an all-too-immediate reminder that the spectre of war and mass death in Europe is tragically not something confined to the history books.
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Hide AdAs Defence Secretary Ben Wallace aptly put it, “What remembrance is about is recognising that freedom isn’t free – people make sacrifices and this nation made the ultimate sacrifice on two occasions in the great wars, but also in other conflicts, and remembrance is a time to reflect on that.”
The Queen believed Remembrance Sunday to be one of her most important royal duties and it was entirely appropriate that the design of the wreath laid by King Charles was a tribute to ones used by his late mother and grandfather George VI.
The day was marked around the UK, with services also taking place at the National Memorial Arboretum in Staffordshire and the WW1 Memorial in Portsmouth, as well as across Yorkshire.
While the two world wars most associated with Remembrance Sunday are becomingly increasingly distant in time, the lessons of honouring the sacrifices of those who served in them and other conflicts which followed rightly remains an important national priority.