Poppies: the Flower of Memorial Day

— by Margie Doyle —

Velma Doty gives Memorial Day poppy to Andy Willard and his daughter Keagan

Memorial Day will be observed at American Legion Post 93 in Eastsound with a commemorative Memorial Exhibit on Sunday and Memorial Day Monday, May 25 & 26, from noon to 4 p.m. Over 50 veterans and families are participating in this exhibit to be held at the Post Hall, located at 793 Crescent Beach Dr.

The American Legion Women’s Auxiliary is selling the traditional red paper poppies, hand-made by Veterans for $1 each suggested contribution. All funds go to benefit Veterans through the American Legion.

From its association with poppies flowering in the spring of 1915 on the battlefields of Belgium, France and Gallipoli this vivid red flower has become synonymous with great loss of life in war.

German troops carry ladders through trenches in the Ypres salient 1915

Yet the scope of the poppy and its connection with the memory of those who have died in war has been expanded to help the living too. It was the inspiration and dedication of two women who promoted this same “Memorial Flower” as the means by which funds could be raised to support those in need of help, most especially servicemen and civilians suffering from physical and mental hardship as a result of war. (from www.thegreatwar.uk)

In Flanders Fields

In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.

By Major John McCrae

During the early days of the Second Battle of Ypres a young Canadian artillery officer, Lieutenant Alexis Helmer, was killed on 2nd May, 1915 when an exploding German artillery shell landed near him. He was serving in the same Canadian artillery unit as a friend of his, the Canadian military doctor and artillery commander Major John McCrae.

As the brigade doctor, John McCrae was asked to conduct the burial service for Alexis Helmer because the chaplain had been called away somewhere else on duty that evening. McCrae conducted a simple service at the graveside, reciting from memory some passages from the Church of England’s ‘Order of Burial of the Dead’. A wooden cross marked the burial place. The grave has since been lost. Lieutenant Alexis Helmer is now commemorated on Panel 10 of the Menin Gate Memorial to the Missing in Ypres; he is one of the 54,896 soldiers who have no known grave in the battlefields of the Ypres Salient.

It is believed that later that evening, after the burial, John began the draft for his now famous poem “In Flanders Fields”.

Alexis Helmerf was 22 years old and a popular young officer. Before the outbreak of war he had graduated from McGill University with a degree in Civil Engineering.