November 1928 - Ten Years On

[George Armstrong Custer]

Does anyone know of any published studies which give any specific detail on how the 10th anniversary of the Armistice was marked in Britain in November 1928 and if, and in what ways, this differed from preceding years? I'm not aware of any books which go into the subject in any depth, but stand to be corrected on that. Monographs or articles in journals might be a more likely source, and I'd be grateful to be pointed in the direction of any.

ciao,

GAC

[simonharley]

Does anyone know of any published studies which give any specific detail on how the 10th anniversary of the Armistice was marked in Britain in November 1928 and if, and in what ways, this differed from preceding years? I'm not aware of any books which go into the subject in any depth, but stand to be corrected on that. Monographs or articles in journals might be a more likely source, and I'd be grateful to be pointed in the direction of any.

ciao,

GAC

Have a look at The Times online archive. Compared to the Gale system I'm used to it's a pain to use but relatively navigable.

Armistice Day fell on a Sunday. The framework that we know today, other than "Remembrance Sunday", was already in place. Poppies were sold, albeit closer to Armistice day. Services were held at war memorials. A great service was held at the Cenotaph in London (described in The Times as "The Empire's great central ceremony") as in the years before. And a festival of Remembrance was held at the Royal Albert Hall. it would seem that there was no reason (quite rightly) to do anything special to mark the occasion, other than for speakers to reiterate the message of peace and remember the fallen with the crowds who were able to attend such services on their day off rather than just observe the minute of silence as they had done previously.

Simon

[truthergw]

I have no evidence but I'd be surprised if there were no reference to the death of FM Earl Haig in January of that year.

[George Armstrong Custer]

That's one of the factors - in addition to it being the occasion of the marking of the first decade - which I wondered about, Tom. Simon, thanks for suggesting the Times archive, I will take a look through that. By this time, as Charles Carrigngton has observed, those ex-soldiers who wanted to mark Armistice Day in celebratory comradeship as well as remembrance were finding themselves increasingly at odds with official events imposing a tone of funereal mourning to the exclusion of anything else. One of the things I'm wondering is if the tenth anniversary provided an excuse for any late examples of groups of ex-soldiers like Carrington and his chums having 'no end of a party.'

ciao,

GAC

[MartinWills]

There was a very large RBL battlefields tour which is quite well documented in an RBL souvenir book.

[George Armstrong Custer]

Now that sounds interesting Martin - be very grateful if you can come up with some details of the book in question.

ciao,

GAC