Dan Jarvis: Honouring those who gave their lives

At 11am today I will join people around the country and pause in silence to remember the sacrifice of those who have fallen in the service of our country.

This has been a particularly poignant year of remembrance. In June we remembered that it was 70 years 
since the Allies laid siege to the Normandy beaches as part of the D-Day landings.

In August we commemorated 100 years since the outbreak of the First World War. In September we reflected on 70 years since the Allies launched Operation Market Garden – an airborne operation in to Holland. And in October the Union Flag was lowered for the final time in Camp Bastion.

So this period of remembrance now gives us an important opportunity to reflect and to remember those who made the ultimate sacrifice – those who lost their lives so that we can enjoy peace and freedom.

As we reflect on the First World War, it’s hard to imagine now what it must have been like to live through a conflict where around seven times that many soldiers would lose their lives each week.

Or to appreciate how much of a scar was left on the country by the first day of the Battle of the Somme, when 20,000 men were cut down in a single day.

One reason why it’s harder for us to grasp today is that we’ve lost our connection to the people who actually experienced it.

The D-Day anniversaries reminded us how privileged we are that so many veterans who fought for our freedom are still with us today. For them, the Second World War is still very much a war of memory. That can no longer be said for the First World War. And that does change the nature of the commemorations. The sad death of the last Tommy – Harry Patch in 2009, at the age of 111 – marked the transition of the First World War from a war of memory to a war of history.

But the period of remembrance is not just about remembering the fallen. We should also think about their families and the impact war has had upon them.

A couple of weeks ago, the memorial cairn – the small monument that commemorated all those who had been killed in Afghanistan – was removed from Camp Bastion. The next day I spoke with the brother of someone from Barnsley who was killed while serving in Helmand province. He told me that it meant a lot to his family that Yorkshire people take the period of remembrance so seriously – that they treat it with reverence.

Despite the grief the family have suffered and the pain they have endured, they are comforted by the fact that across our region there would be thousands of people who turn out on Remembrance Sunday to pay their respects to the fallen.

Earlier this year, I travelled to the Somme to pay my respects to those soldiers who came from Yorkshire and lost their lives during the First World War. I stood in the trenches they had defended. I imagined the terror they must have experienced. The piercing shrill of the whistle signalling the advance and the order to go ‘over the top’.

I walked the ground over which they had fought – open rolling countryside that has changed little over the past century. I knelt in front of their graves. It felt like they were a long way from home.

I visited the Memorial of the Missing at Thiepval. And it was there, as I read the names inscribed on the memorial, that I saw my own name staring back at me – D. Jarvis. It was a sobering experience. But I came away comforted by the fact that what were once landscapes of war are now landscapes of peace.

What has been a heartening experience is the level of interest from people across our region in supporting the service charities, and in particular the Royal British Legion poppy appeal, which help ensure we commemorate the service and sacrifice of all of those who have fallen as well as those who continue to serve.

Regardless of our views on the rights and wrongs of the various conflicts, I am proud that we had a huge turnout across the region on Sunday, as people came together to think about those who marched off from Yorkshire nearly 100 years ago to serve in the trenches, those who would do the same in the Second World War and all those who have served and fallen since.

In this important year of remembrance, I know we will remember them all.

• Dan Jarvis is Labour MP for Barnsley Central and a former Major in the Parachute Regiment who served in Kosovo, Iraq and Afghanistan.