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Thousands of military personnel, ex-servicemen and public gathered under the blue sky on Sunday London as the king Charles III Led Britain’s annual commemoration of the country’s war dead.
As Parliament’s Big Ben bell rang at 11 a.m., the crowd fell silent for two minutes of silence, which was broken by an artillery blast and the sound of “The Last Post” by the Royal Marines buglers.
The 76-year-old king, dressed in the uniform of an army field marshal, laid a wreath of red paper poppies against a black background at the base of the Cenotaph war memorial near Parliament. Built over a century ago in honor of British and Allied soldiers killed in the First World War, it has become the center of annual ceremonies for members of the military and civilian services killed in that war and subsequent conflicts.
The national ceremony of remembrance is held each year at 11am on the Sunday nearest to the anniversary of the end of the First World War on 11 November 1918. Similar memorial services are held in dozens of towns and cities. Britain and at UK military bases overseas.
A military band played as the heir to the throne Prince William Followed his father in laying a wreath at the simple stone monument in Portland, inscribed with the words “The Illustrious Dead.”
Other members of the royal family followed suit, including the king’s youngest brother, Prince Edward – but not former Prince Andrew Mountbatten Windsor. The king last month stripped her brother Andrew of his titles and evicted him from his royal mansion over his ties to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
Wreaths were also laid by Prime Minister Keir Starmer, other political leaders and diplomats from Commonwealth countries.
Queen camillaThe Princess of Wales and other members of the royal family watched from their traditional spot on the balcony of the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office.
Many of the wreaths were made from poppies, and most of the attendees wore paper poppies on their lapels. The scarlet flowers that bloomed on the muddy battlefields and makeshift cemeteries of northern France and Belgium during the First World War – made famous by the poem “In Flanders Fields” – have become a symbol of remembrance in Britain and other countries.