On Remembrance Day - the Political Uses of Invoking Britain’s Wartime Past

By Harriet Coombs, Third Year History Student

Last weekend the Queen led the nation in marking a different kind of Remembrance Sunday, with people around the UK privately paying their respects at home as a result of the coronavirus pandemic.  For the first time in 89 years, the service was closed off to the general public.  Despite the scaled-back nature of the service, strikingly familiar images were projected into the homes of those around the country at 11am; wreaths laid by members of the Royal Family and the PM, the Queen overlooking the Cenotaph at Whitehall. The simple stone structure unveiled by George V a century ago on 11 November 1920 has been the site of the annual Service of Remembrance since 1919 and has thus become concretized in our national memory as a memorial site.  Though the absence of veterans this year at Whitehall’s service was acutely felt, the two-minute silence nonetheless pertinently reflected an entire nation’s commemoration of the sacrifices made by the armed forces community involved in both world wars.  For many, the site of the Cenotaph alone intuitively invokes memories of Britain’s wartime past. 

            In the UK, we are used to politicians appealing in a more literal sense to interpretations of our shared wartime history to make their political case. The idea of a collective national memory can be and is evoked for political reasons.  The use of war rhetoric has been visible throughout much of the ongoing Brexit debate.  In a 2016 interview with the Telegraph, Boris Johnson argued that the EU were trying to create a superstate: “Napoleon, Hitler, various people tried this out, and it ends tragically.  The EU is an attempt to do this by different methods,” he said.  Jacob Rees-Mogg too has referred to past British victories against EU countries, stating “It’s the great reform bill, it’s the bill of rights, it’s Waterloo, its’s Agincourt, it’s Crécy.  We win all of these things.”  Though notably absent from Johnson and Rees-Mogg’s arguments are any similar appeals to an interpretation of English history which stresses the country’s long and continuous ties to the rest of Europe, both effectively invoke collective memories of Britain’s wartime history to stake their claim.  The arrival of the coronavirus pandemic in the UK has meant that, perhaps more than ever, we are being encouraged to look to our national past.  The British public have been frequently urged to demonstrate the “Blitz Spirit” of our ancestors: an attitude of resilience and camaraderie which emerged in the face of German bombing in World War II.  Even Queen Elizabeth II, in her lockdown speech to the nation earlier this Spring referred to the British attributes of “self-discipline, of quiet good-humoured resolve and of fellow-feeling,” all of which have been historicised as characteristics of Blitz Britain. 

There are several problems involved with referencing this moment in history where Britain overcame its greatest crisis.  The very phenomenon of the Blitz Spirit itself must be viewed critically. Wartime London is rightly remembered for the continuation of everyday life.  Shop windows read ‘bombed but not defeated’, the unreleased but infamous ‘Keep Calm and Carry On’ poster became the cornerstone by which Britons of the 1940’s lived.  In London, only around two cases of “bomb neurosis” were recorded per week in the first three months of bombing.  Despite this, many people’s life did not continue as normal during the Blitz. Entire streets were reduced to rubble and children were evacuated to the countryside as death as destruction became the hallmarks of everyday life.  Extracts from Mass Observation files in the aftermath of Bristol blitzes in December of 1940 do much to bring into question the notion of a Blitz Spirit: the report mentions complaints about the frequent flooding of a Knowle shelter, the feelings of open defeatism amongst younger workers and the high proportion of depression in Bristol compared to neighbouring cities.  In addition to this, the idea that Britain acted alone in this period is misguided.  Part of the Allied powers and supported by the US, Britain was part of an international community facing a common threat.  Clearly, the conception of COVID-19 as a threat that can be likened to that of Nazi Germany is problematic.  For a start, it might be argued that more robust opposition to the second lockdown announced by Boris Johnson on November 1 is, paradoxically, a flaw in the use of the government’s wartime propaganda from the first time round.  With coronavirus, there will be no VE Day. Even with a vaccine, we are not suddenly going to be let into the streets.  Instead, we are going to have to adapt for a long time until we regain a semblance of ‘normal’ life.  

  Perhaps what I am trying to make the case for is the argument that flippant remarks made about Britain’s wartime past subsume a period which for the nation was defined by pain, suffering and untold hardship.  Many feel they have a right to be incredibly proud of Britain’s rich national history, particularly in the case of World War II where, as education minister Gavin Williamson recently put it “this country made a difference and changed things for better around the world.”  The annual commemoration of the loss of life in both world wars supports the idea that as a nation, we have a history of wartime sacrifice worth honouring. The horrors of war and the extent of hardship in wartime Britain deserve not to be undermined by complex comparisons, especially those that gloss over the realities of war in the name of constructing a national spirit. This year’s Remembrance Day Service served to remind us in full of those who gave their lives, their health, and their loved ones, to protect those at home in Britain, and beyond. 

They shall not grow old, as we that are left grow old:

Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.

At the going down of the sun and in the morning

We will remember them.

Cover Image Credit: Ian Taylor on Unsplash