Poppy Power

Armistice Day on 11th November will mark 96 years since the end of the First World War. Red poppies will abound in the run up to Remembrance Sunday, but how many of us know how the tradition began and that other colours are available?

In 1915, John McCrae, a doctor serving with the Canadian armed forces, was so deeply moved by what he saw on the front line that he wrote the poem ‘In Flanders Fields’. It begins:

“In Flanders fields the poppies blow

Between the crosses, row on row,”

Three years later, Moina Michael, an American academic, wrote a poem in reply, ‘We Shall Keep the Faith’, in which she promised to always wear a poppy as a symbol of remembrance. She went on to promote the idea of selling silk poppies to raise funds to assist disabled veterans, a practice taken up by the American Legion Auxiliary in 1921. Red poppies sold in the UK today raise money for the Royal British Legion, which offers support to current and former military personnel and their families.

However, in 1926, just five years after the first red poppies were sold, the No More War Movement put forward the idea of white poppies. Those who wear them argue that the red poppy is militaristic, political and divisive, particularly in Northern Ireland where it is worn mainly by the Unionist community. White poppies sold in the UK today raise funds for the Peace Pledge Union, whose work is primarily educational.

In addition, animal rights group Animal Aid has issued a purple poppy as a reminder that animals have been, and continue to be, victims of war. The intention is to raise awareness and to raise money for the organisation’s campaigns against animal abuse.

So this Remembrance Day, on 8th November, choose your poppy and wear it with pride, whichever colour it happens to be. Lest we forget.

Published in My Moseley and Kings Heath, October 2015.