The Kew Cenotaph, located at the junction of Cotham Road and High Street, was opened roughly 99 years ago on 30 August 1925 by the Earl of Stradbroke and the Mayor of Kew. The memorial structure was paid for by the council through the sale of unused land. The site commemorates the sacrifices of all those Australians from the area who fought and died in World War I.
On Monday 11 November at 11am, members of my family together with many others gathered for a Remembrance Day observance at the Kew Cenotaph, where wreaths and bouquets of flowers were placed on behalf of all the Carey community under these moving inscriptions:
To the honour of the living and the glory of the dead, who served in the Great War 1914–1918, The brave do not die, their deeds live for ever, and in grateful recognition of glorious service.
Both at the Kew Cenotaph and at other observances within and beyond Carey on Remembrance Day were words from the poem ‘For the Fallen’. They were originally written by Robert Laurence Binyon, known to family and friends as Laurence, who was an English academic and poet. His dad, Frederick, was a Church of England Minister.
Unable to enlist due to his age, Laurence volunteered and spent his annual leave from the British Museum working as a medical orderly with the Red Cross on the Western Front during World War I.
Laurence wrote ‘For the Fallen’ in mid-September 1914, a few weeks after the outbreak of fighting in World War I. The British Expeditionary Force started experiencing devastating losses on the Western Front and disheartening casualty lists started appearing in English newspapers. Laurence had not yet seen the horrors of trench warfare firsthand.
Laurence was later to write how contents found in the Book of Daniel shaped his thinking for the poem. In chapter 12, Daniel is told that:
‘There shall be a time of anguish, such as has never occurred since nations first came into existence. But at that time your people shall be delivered, everyone who is found written in God’s book of life.
‘Many of those who sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt. Those who are wise shall shine like the brightness of the sky, and those who lead many to righteousness, like the stars will shine for ever and ever.’
Remembrance Day observances and the writer of the Book of Daniel invite listeners to continue to follow the example of those who do good and try and do the same whenever and wherever we can.
May the following Remembrance Day prayer help guide our own decision making.
Let us pray.
Heavenly Father, we remember how your Son, had great compassion for those who suffered. We bring to you those who still suffer as the result of war.
Hear our prayer, for those who live with the pain and scars of bodily injury;
for those whose minds are shattered by the horrors which they witnessed or endured;
for those who have been bereaved;
for those who do not believe in you or trust those around them. Grant to them peace of mind and heart, and relief from all their suffering, through Jesus Christ the Prince of Peace. Amen.
Lest We Forget.
Revd Scott Bramley
Middle School Chaplain
