Record Armistice Day temperatures

COMMEMORATIONS took place across Britain yesterday on what has become the warmest Armistice Day on record.

Big Ben rang out 11 times to mark the start of the two-minute silence at 11am as veterans gathered at the Cenotaph in Whitehall.

The Duke and Duchess of Gloucester attended a commemoration at the National Memorial Arboretum, in Staffordshire, while services were held at war memorials up and down the country.

Foreign Secretary James Cleverly, who attended a remembrance service held by French president Emmanuel Macron in Paris, said that ‘as we salute our troops’, people should also remember Ukraine’s ‘fight for freedom’.

Among the many veterans marking Armistice Day was Joe Cattini, 99, who visited the 94th Field Of Remembrance at Westminster Abbey. Mr Cattini, who took part in the Normandy landings, is a Normandy Memorial Trust ambassador. Temperatures yesterday broke records for the warmest Armistice Day in England, Scotland and Northern Ireland, and the UK as a whole, although not Wales.

Provisional figures from the Met Office show the warmest place was Myerscough in Lancashire, on 19.5C (67.1F), while Lossiemouth in Moray reached 19.1C (66.4F) and Magilligan in Londonderry hit 17.4C (63.3F). The previous record was 17.8C (64.04F), which was reached at Kensington Palace on November 11, 1997.

It will be even warmer this weekend, with a high of 20C (68F) possible on Sunday. King Charles and the Queen Consort are due to lead the national Remembrance Sunday events at the Cenotaph tomorrow.