My boyfriend family fought on the other side. Tbf so did mine…and yes im not british
Do you have a remembrance day? If so, what’s it like?
My grandparents both came home but were never the same again. One drank himself to death. Neither of them would EVER talk about it
WW1 - grandfather was a stoker in the RN. His ship was involved in the battle of Jutland. He was then in the RN reserves until he aged out on Sept 1st 1939. A great uncle was KIA in the trenches in France. Another was in the Mesopotamia campaign under Townsend. He had a rough time of it, but I don’t know the details.
WW2 - dad was in the RASC. In Normandy on D-Day+6, initially working on Mulberry B, but was then given a Sherman that had had its turret blown off and was clearing roads toward Caen. Later he was guarding munitions factories back in the UK, which is where he met mum, who had started the war filling jars with jam, but then was filling shells with explosive.
Malaya “emergency” - an uncle was there and hated everything about it.
Anything in that area seems to have been particularly bad I’m really sorry he experienced that
My great grandfather fought in the second world war but never talked about it. He died when I was a going teenager and really wish I could’ve asked him more. We only realised the extent of where he fought when we found his campaign medals after he passed away, one of which was Italy and we can guess was one of the more brutal campaigns. My mum and others said when they tried to talk about it he shut it down quickly though.
A lot of wider family fought in that war but we never brought it up or really talked about it until it was too late. One died recently and is in this article: https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025/nov/09/british-asian-families-share-stories-greatest-generation-fought-for-britain.
This made this Sunday more emotional for me as he’s the last I know of who was part of that war but at least he got some respect for it and his story told, unlike others.
I was quite sad to see that someone had put up lots of union jacks and England flags on the war memorial near me that I stopped at to give thanks and tell my son about his ancestors who fought in it. My ancestors fought too and it was not Britain against the world. Let’s leave the current divisive politics out of it so we can think of and appreciate anyone who picked up arms, traveled half way around the world, saw things and did things they should never have had to do.
I couldn’t agree more! Whether you agree or not, the soldiers were ordinary young men with their whole lives ahead of them. They suffered and died, often horribly and went through things I wouldn’t wish on my worst enemy.
Your link is really interesting. I was honestly surprised when I found out how many BAME people fought in the war because it’s not reflected in media and wasn’t at school. It’s a literal whitewashing and it’s a massive wrong. Imagine being in nazi occupied areas… and you’re not even white! The risk is through the roof and they have my never-ending respect
Unfortunately theres a long lost of things we weren’t taught in school in England. One of the biggest omissions in my view is Irish history, which is still so relevant to this day. On one hand you can’t teach everything but on the other hand, there has to be room for this stuff.
Indians even fought in the western front in WW1, contrary to almost every documentary or film out there! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_Army_during_World_War_I
Yep even just one lesson on my would be something!
