Remembrance Day

Remembrance Day (Australia, Canada, United Kingdom), also known as Poppy Day (South Africa and Malta), Veterans Day (United States), Armistice Day (United Kingdom, New Zealand and many other Commonwealth countries; and the original name of the holiday internationally) is a day to commemorate the sacrifice of veterans and civilians in World War I, World War II, and other wars. It is observed on November 11 to recall the end of World War I on that date in 1918. The observance is specifically dedicated to members of the armed forces who were killed during war, and was created by King George V of the United Kingdom on November 7, 1919 (possibly upon the suggestion of Edward George Honey though Wellesley Tudor Pole, who established two ceremonial periods of remembrance based on events in 1917).

The poppies

The poppy's significance to Remembrance Day is a result of Canadian military physician John McCrae's poem In Flanders Fields. The poppy emblem was chosen because of the poppies that bloomed across some of the worst battlefields of Flanders in World War I, their red colour an appropriate symbol for the bloodshed of trench warfare. A Frenchwoman by the name of Madame E. Guérin introduced the widely used artificial poppies given out today. Some people choose to wear white poppies, which emphasises a desire for peaceful alternatives to military action. Until 1996, poppies were made by disabled veterans in Canada, but they have since been made by a private contractor.