National Post (National Edition)
IN SILENCE, WE REMEMBER THEM
PANDEMIC ROBS VETS OF IN-PERSON EXPERIENCE
The silence was the same. In this awful pandemic, a year where everything has had to change, the National Remembrance Day ceremony on Wednesday also had to adapt.
Gone were the crowds that normally gather around the Cenotaph in Ottawa and spill out onto adjacent streets. This year, they were told to stay home.
The artillery still fired a 21-gun salute, the sound echoing just a bit more off the empty streets. Office windows overlooking the memorial, normally crowded with people taking in the ceremony, were empty, but a handful of construction workers watched from the roof of Parliament's East Block.
The Canadian Armed Forces Central band still played, their shoes shined and uniforms pressed. A few veterans still took in the ceremony, their medals polished and salutes still crisp.
In a normal year, more than 30,000 people can flood into downtown Ottawa, watching from the sidewalks and from the eastern side of the Parliament Hill grounds. When 11 a.m. hits, that mass of humanity is always perfectly silent and, despite all that has changed in 2020, on Wednesday that silence remained the same.
But much else of the ceremony was different.
Danny Martin, the Royal Canadian Legion's ceremony director, said they knew well in advance this year would have to be different due to COVID-19.
“By some time around June, we knew we were going to be affected by it, we knew it wasn't going away,” he said.
Elbow bumps replaced handshakes at the ceremony, the few spectators were in socially distanced chairs with their masks on and the children's choir brought just three members.
The legion live streamed the ceremony and television networks still broadcast it across the country, but Martin said moving to a completely virtual event was never part of the plan.
“In the spirit of the soldiers that fought, it was a physical thing, and we want this to be a physical thing,” he said.
Health regulations prevented them from having more than 100 people at the site, so they tried to include as many veterans groups as possible. In a normal year, a wide range of dignitaries would lay wreaths, but this year only a few, including the prime minister and governor general, did so in person during the ceremony. Dozens more were placed at the Cenotaph in advance.
Debbie Sullivan was also there in person in the role of Silver Cross mother, honouring her son Lt. Chris Saunders, who died onboard the HMCS Chicoutimi, a sub Canada purchased from Britain that caught fire on its voyage to Canada from Scotland.
Martin said, for many veterans, a live in-person ceremony is essential
“They come from a world where the technology isn't there and they don't relate to pictures being broadcast over Zoom,” he said.
COVID-19 is particularly deadly to people over 70 and the average age of Second World War veterans in Canada is 94. Martin said, with that in mind, the oldest veterans in Canada stayed home this year.
“We don't have any of the World War Two veterans here because it was just too dangerous for them.”
Bill Black, president of the Ottawa chapter of the Korean War Veterans Association, was there representing his 105 member-strong group.
As he stood at the Cenotaph, 26 of his association's members were at the Perley and Rideau Veterans' Health Centre, in the Ottawa suburbs, a facility that has seen 13 deaths from COVID-19.
Black said the legion did a remarkable job keeping the ceremony as normal as possible. He said, hopefully, next year everyone will be able to return.
“It would be nice to be back here,” he said.
He said coming to the ceremony had been a constant for many of his colleagues.
“We have got one that will be turning 100 years old next month, but he is still active. He has been coming for many, many years, but he couldn't today.”
Maj-Gen. Guy Chapdelaine, Chaplain General of the Canadian Armed Forces, said COVID-19 had forced distance upon Canadians but it didn't change the purpose of remembering.
“Our distance from one another diminishes neither our gratitude nor the inspiration we draw from the example of these heroes.”
Rabbi Reuven Bulka also addressed the ceremony and said the pandemic could help us all better relate to the sacrifice soldier went through.
“Today, we are not at war, but we are in a battle for our individual and collective health and wellbeing,” he said. “Those of us who never really went through war, now have a better idea of what it means to be separated from loved ones. Everyone one of us has been separated from loved ones.”
Bulka said the sacrifice veterans made was different in one key respect.
“Our veterans, who we remember today and always, they chose to fight for our country, for our freedom; Knowing that it meant separation from their family.”
He said that sacrifice has continued into this year as soldiers were pressed into service to help overwhelmed long-term care facilities.
“When care facilities were short staffed, whom did we call? Our soldiers.”
Traditionally, at the end of the ceremony after the dignitaries have left, waves of people walk up to the Cenotaph to take poppies off their jackets and place them on the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier.
Despite a plea for them not to come, a small handful of residents lined up on the edges of the ceremony to watch.
When the barricades came down, they came forward a few at a time, still keeping their distance and added their poppies to the pile.
By the afternoon, there was a pile of red poppies starting to cover the tomb. People stood silently waiting their turn, because the silence remained the same.
ELBOW BUMPS, DISTANCED CHAIRS AND CHILDREN'S CHOIR WITH JUST THREE MEMBERS.