The procession forms
Today in Epeigné, as all over France, there was the ceremony to remember the village's war dead. In the UK we have Remembrance Day on the 11th November but don't specially mark the end of the Second World War in Europe.
Before the war memorial listening to the Maire's speech
Michel Mergot, the current Maire, and Jacky Marchau, his predecessor
The wreath
Laying the wreath: above and below
Entering the cemetery
Michel Mergot
Beforehand:
Bloody flat packs – they never give you proper instructions!
Thank goodness the flag's sorted!
5 comments:
To me, May 8th is the starting day of Europe’s second colonization wave by US commercial imperialism, the so-called “ERP” or Marshall Plan. And I’m not sure it was something to celebrate.
Thank You Jim, beautiful pictures with my grand-father, I'm very happy !
Johan
Thanks Johan.
Luc. In part spectacularly wrong! This was a simple ceremony to remember those, some only 18 or 19years old, who had been killed trying to rid their country of an invading force.
Sorry Jim. I didn’t want to hurt feelings.
I know it is a very sensitive point both in France and UK. We had a similar ceremony here in Corneilla (chaired by a communist Mayor and a smashing lady at that too) . I have the deepest respect for those who offered their blood. But I have as many German friends. And it was no victory, it was the end of a defeat for the whole of mankind.
And, loosing Hitler’s hated grip on a part of the continent, we exchanged it for US hated grip on us as well. I feel a free man in Bundesrepublik Deutschland now and I’m not allowed landing in the US!
« Putain, putain, c’est vachement bien, car nous sommes tous des Européens! (S. Eicher and Arno). »
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