Reffell Family History

At the eleventh hour, on the eleventh day of the eleventh month

Following the end of the 'War to end all wars' in 1918, there was a very public outcry of grief at the loss of so many lives. Never before had any conflict been experienced by the non-military population. The Imperial (later Commonwealth) War Graves Commission embarked on a massive scheme to remember all those lost, by a name on a grave or a memorial. Additionally at locations all around the country, memorials were built such as formal monuments like that at Tunbridge Wells and Ipswich, but also memorial halls and other spaces dedicated to the fallen. Poems such as Laurence Binyon's (1869-1943) 1914 work 'For the Fallen' captured the public mood, and the fourth stanza adorns numerous war memorials and is used in many remembrance services;

They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn At the going down of the sun and in the morning We will remember them.

At the centre of the nation's remembrance services, on the Sunday nearest to 11th November at 11am each year, a Remembrance Service is held at the Cenotaph in London to commemorate British and Commonwealth servicemen and women who died in the two World Wars and later conflicts. At one stage it was thought that with the passing of many veterans that the remembrance services around the country may have died out. In fact more people are now attending these services than ever before and they have become symbols to the nation, both of the futility of war and a way of remembering a lost generation of parents, grandparents and great-grandparents.