Some events were waiting to happen in history and they would have one way or the other. Following the assassination of the Archduke Ferdinand II, the heir apparent of the powerful Austro-Hungarian Empire, they declared war against Serbia. To help the Serbians Russians joined the war and soon Germany joined the war to help AustriaHungary. The various alliance treaties of the time brought Britain and France to the war on the side of Russians, soon many countries joined the war in Europe, Africa, Arabia, Asia..
The war took a name of its own, "The Great War../..The World War". The death and destruction caused by the war took an epic proportion, never before has so many died, wounded and cities and countries destroyed as the war continued for four long years.
On the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month of 1918 an Armistice or a truce was signed. The day began to be called as Armistice day and later became Rememberance Day remembering all the soldiers who fell in the war.
The simple and the common red poppy flower was the first flower that grew over the marked and unmarked tomb of the fallen soldiers in the battlefield.
Flanders is in Belgium which became a killing field just like Dunkirk became in the second world war two decades later. It was one of the many battlegrounds of the long war.
A Canadian soldier fighting on the side of Allies wrote this poem which is like A rememberance day Anthem.
Our Sikh regiment fought for Britain in the war in Europe, Arabia, Jerusalem...
Almost every British India town has a cenotaph which is a monument raised to the memory of the dead who are buried elsewhere. We have two at Fort Cochin.
