Cities and towns across NI
THOUSANDS gathered yesterday across Northern Ireland to join in quiet reflection and pay tribute to those who made the ultimate sacrifice.
Around 200 people gathered at the Cenotaph at the Diamond in Londonderry city centre for this year’s Remembrance Sunday.
The Queen was represented by the Lord Lieutenant, Dr Angela Garvey, who laid the first wreath.
As the Guildhall clock struck 11, those who were present observed two minutes of silence.
DUP councillor Drew Thompson represented Derry and Strabane District Council in the absence of Sinn Fein mayor Maoliosa McHugh, whose party has never attended the Remembrance Day ceremony in Derry.
SDLP deputy mayor John Boyle, who has attended previously, was understood not to have been available.
However, the nationalist party was represented at the Cenotaph, as was the UUP.
Following the short parade from the Church of Ireland Deanery in Bishop’s Street, Presbyterian Moderator Rev Dr Noble McNeely was joined in prayer by the Dean of Derry, the Very Rev Raymond Stewart and Methodist minister Rev Peter Murray.
Wreaths were also laid by two visiting Chelsea Pensioners, Walter Swann and Eddie Reid, as well as member of the armed forces, emergency services and Lisneal and Foyle Colleges. Lisburn also paused to remember the fallen at a short act of Remembrance at the city’s War Memorial.
Gordon Rogan, chairman of Lisburn Branch of the Royal British Legion, gave the exhortation and a bugler from 2nd Battalion The Rifles played the Last Post and Reveille.
Meanwhile, the Orange Order held an Armistice Day commemoration service at its headquarters in Schomberg House in Belfast.
Deputy grand master Harold Henning said this year was “particularly poignant, as we reflect on the courage and selflessness of those who fought and died during the First World War”.
“Many were members of this institution who took their Or- ange ritual and tradition with them to the trenches; with some even wearing their sashes as they went over the top.”
Mr Henning recalled the horror of the IRA Poppy Day bomb- From left: Members of the Cathedral Youth Club lay a wreath at the Cenotaph, and Joe Halley representing theIrish UN forces during the Remembrance Sunday Service at the Cenotaph in Derry Joan Baird, mayor of Causeway Coast and Glens, at the service in Coleraine