Nation falls silent on battle’s 100th anniversary

THE nation fell silent to honour thousands of soldiers killed in the Battle of the Somme 100 years after the bloodiest day in British military history.

Ceremonies across the United Kingdom honoured the hundreds of thousands of victims of the brutal offensive which started in northern France on July 1 1916.

The two-minute silence ended at 7.30am, the time when the British, Commonwealth and French forces went “over the top” a century ago.

The British Army suffered almost 60,00 casualties on the first day alone and more than a million men would be killed or wounded on both sides over the course of the 141-day offensive.

The silence came after a night-long vigil led in Britain by the Queen and at the Thiepval Memorial to the Missing of the Somme, which towers over the rolling Picardy fields where so many fell.

Senior royals including the Duke and Duchess of Cornwall, the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge and Prince Harry, were due to join David Cameron and French President Francois Hollande and other leaders at a memorial for a service of remembrance in front of an audience of 10,000.

In London, people lined Parliament Square to pay tribute, where the twominute reflection was marked with the sound of gunfire.

Whistles were blown and Big Ben chimed when the two minutes were over, though many people who had stopped on their commute still continued to pause in reflection.