We will remember them ........

We decided we would drive up to Staffordshire today to the National Memorial Arboretum, for me to see it for the first time and to find the name of my godson James, who died in Afghanistan in September 2012.
 
It was a glorious day and even though there were lots of people there, once you were in the grounds you could lose yourself in your own thoughts.
 
We started at the Armed Forces Memorial, and found James’ name.  What made such an impression on me were all the names before his on the memorial and those after …. names are added year on year, which makes the sculpture of the sculptor such a poignant symbol: “we will remember them today, tomorrow, forever”.  We found his name again on the Camp Bastion memorial.  We couldn’t find his tree, but will try again next time.
 
The Hand at Peace is the memorial to the sufferers of mental health illnesses like PTSD.  Today we would probably have recognised that many of those convicted of desertion were suffering illness, and the “Shot at Dawn memorial is to the 306 soldiers of the First World War who were shot at dawn for cowardice or desertion, and were granted posthumous pardons in 2006.  Each stake has the name of the soldier, so many of them aged 22 or less
 
We will go back again, on a day when maybe there are fewer people, to walk the grounds again and look for James’ tree.  His grandfather and my father served in the RAF throughout the Second World War and came out the other side.  In all the conflicts, so many don’t.