Britain celebrates VE Day after seismic poll
BRITAIN marked the 70th anniversary of Victory in Europe Day (VE Day) yesterday with events to be attended by top politicians despite chaos in some party ranks following the Conservatives’ shock election triumph.
Putting the political disarray to one side, the country fell silent for two minutes at 2pm, marking the moment when wartime prime minister Winston Churchill broadcast his historic speech announcing the end of World War 2.
Following six years of air raids, blackouts, economic hardships and fighting that claimed the lives of almost 400 000 Britons, the country seized the chance to celebrate the end of the war on May 8 1945, with even the future Queen Elizabeth II anonymously joining the ecstatic throngs in central London.
“It took a couple of days to really sink in,” 101year-old former naval officer John Harrison recalled. “All you could hear were church bells, which were marvellous.
“When the news came … my team said, ‘Well, there’s only one place [to be], I think John, and that’s the nearest pub.’”
A chain of more than 100 beacons was to be lit across the UK later, and today cathedrals nationwide have been invited to ring their bells.
Commemorations will strike a more sombre tone tomorrow, with members of the royal family, veterans and senior politicians attending a service at Westminster Abbey. There will then be a parade of current personnel and veterans past the balcony of the Treasury building where Churchill made his appearance on VE Day, and a flypast of current and historic aircraft.
Queen Elizabeth II is expected to take part in the celebrations. Her first cousin, Margaret Rhodes, 89, recently lifted the lid on their night of “wonderful bedlam” as they joined in the street party 70 years ago.
“I think it’s one of the things that the queen remembers with great happiness,” Rhodes told the Mail on Sunday newspaper. She also described how the then 19-year-old princess took part in a conga line in front of shocked diners at the Ritz hotel. — AFP