Tag: remembrance
-
ARMY OF SHADOWS
Private Michael Boyd was not cut out for war. Or for a life in the army for that matter. He was too slight in build, too short in stature and too vibrant in spirit. But when war was announced he signed up, caught up in the fervour of patriotism. He had never met a German…
-
A NOS MORTS
The bugle sounded, the flag was lowered. Feet shuffled on gravel. The silence was broken by the diesel engine of a barge. They didn’t close the canal anymore. Some her mother had nursed back to full health, some never recovered. One her mother married. Twenty years later she was alongside her mother as men repeated…
-
CHRISTMAS WITHOUT HER
The overnight snowfall showed no sign of melting. He gave up any thought of his daily walk to the local shop, then remembered it would be closed anyway. A white Christmas would have made her happy. He sat back in his armchair. On the radio they were playing the classic Christmas songs. The lights on…
-
LOVE
‘Fifty-nine dead. Five hundred injured.’ Hannah says it more to herself than anyone else. ‘Terrorists again?’ the young girl playing on the floor asks her. ‘Just a man with a gun.’ ‘It’s never going to stop, is it, Mum?’ ‘It hasn’t stopped since time began. All this violence toward each other,’ she shakes her head.…
-
LEST WE FORGET
Through the sea haze she saw the final stream of small boats appear. From this distance she could make out the decks crammed with soldiers. For nine days the small boats had shuttled across the channel to Dunkirk. Over three hundred thousand men had been saved and returned to Dover. As the boats drew closer, the…