Hundreds of people lined Katherine Street to remember Croydon’s war dead earlier today, as war veterans led dignitaries in a wreath-laying ceremony.
Bugle calls rang out as a mark of respect following the two minute silence at 11am, before Croydon mayor Margaret Mead laid the first wreath at the base of the memorial outside Croydon Town Hall.
She was followed by a soldier from the 2nd Battalion The Rifles laying a wreath in memory of Shirley Rifleman Danny Simpson who was killed while on duty in Helmand Province, Afghanistan in July.
Children from Croydon’s schools also placed their own tributes into a special ‘garden of remembrance’, planting poppy covered crosses with messages to fallen soldiers.
One of them read: “Dear Soldiers. I thank you for fighting in the war. We are here today because you fought for us.”
The ceremony marked the commemoration of Armistice Day, when Germany and the Allied forces officially ceased hostilities in World War One at 11am on November 11, 1918.
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