Remembrance Day ceremonies run the gauntlet from huge national affairs (such as the National Ceremony in Ottawa at the National War Memorial) to private remembrances at ones’ home. However, the Remembrance Day Ceremony held at National Military Cemetery (part of Beechwood Cemetery) is different in that it takes place amongst the fallen dead whose sacrifices we remember on November 11th. The ceremony at the National Military Ceremony does not have the pomp and circumstance or celebrities that one would expect at a National Military Cemetery but is intimate and respectful, ever mindful that the fallen are amongst the living this day. It’s hard not to be more moved by this smaller expression of gratitude when you are standing and walking between the headstones, row on row.
This year the day was bright and cool, although the cold was not overwhelming because of the warming sun and the lack of wind. The crowd of several hundred gathered and this year I noticed a preponderance of children tagging along with their parents, many parents in uniform. There was Cpl David Harding of the Cameron Highlanders with Silas (8 years) and Felicity (5 years) explaining the headstone inscriptions and Major Auger who held her son through much of the ceremony. The Ottawa Catholic Schoolboard Choir provided the music for the ceremony but the children took the time before the event start to wander through the cemetery.
And there were expressions of sorrow for missing friends and family as people embraced in front of their loved ones’ headstones, soldiers placed poppies on comrades graves, and one, MCpl Sagocak of the Royal Canadian Dragoons, had a cigarette and lit one for a friend and mentor who died in Afghanistan. Major (ret’d) Jack Commerford, a 95 year old World War II veteran who landed on Juno Beach on D-Day, laid the wreath on behalf of the Veterans on Parade and the friends that he had lost then and since.
While the National Ceremony is a spectacle that one should see at least once, the ceremony at the National Military Cemetery in Beechwood Cemetery provides a more moving and intimate experience. If ever you need to be someplace on Remembrance Day, there is no better place.
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