Sorrow and futility – these are the sentiments Robert Bulloch feels when thinking about the loss of life resulting from the First and Second World Wars – including members of his own family.
The Richmond resident and amateur historian wants to keep alive the memory of wars Canadians and others have taken part in, so next generations learn from history.
He is particularly frustrated that the First World War caused such devastation, but the world went to war again 20 years later.
“Two generations wiped out … they learned nothing from it,” he said.
In-person Remembrance Day ceremonies have been cancelled at the cenotaph by Richmond City Hall this year due to COVID-19 and moved online.
To compensate for the loss of a large public gathering to honour those who served, Bulloch has created a small memorial for Remembrance Day on his lawn where his neighbours, many of whom are veterans, can pay their respects on Nov. 11.
It will be a small, intimate ceremony, Bulloch said, and it will include The Last Post and Flowers of the Forest.
The memorial will be taken down on Nov. 12, but he is thinking of expanding it next year.
Bulloch, however, does have hope that the next generation is learning. He witnessed this when visiting Belgium and Holland a few years ago and saw how children in those countries had adopted graves of fallen soldiers.
“That really struck a chord,” he said. “It’s a good sign they’re remembering.”
Bulloch collects war memorabilia, and while someone might look at something like a rusty bayonet and say it’s just junk, he sees the history it represents.
“You pick (it) up and you look at it and you see somebody actually held that, somebody actually stuffed it into their rifle and marched into no-man’s land – that’s what it says to me,” Bulloch said.
This Remembrance Day, in addition to paying respect to veterans of wars gone by, Bulloch hopes Canadian will take time to pay respects to Cpl. James Choi, a 29-year-old army reservist in the Royal Westminster Regiment, who was killed in a live-fire training accident on Oct. 31 in Alberta.
He’s left behind friends and family, Bulloch said.
“These guys need to be remembered,” Bulloch said, adding “It’s not all about the veterans from way back… it’s about the modern-day veterans actually being hurt by stuff we didn’t understand back then.”
This includes police, fire fighters and paramedics who struggle with the same type of stress as soldiers, Bulloch said.
“They suffer from the same thing, everything just gets too much for them,” he added.
