Online presentation will replace town Remembrance service

AS Westbury prepares to go into the second national lockdown this week, there will be no public Remembrance observed at the town’s war memorial on the 8th or 11th November. 

The town council had already scaled back its usual Remembrance service due to the pandemic and had urged local people to observe the two minutes’ silence and pay their respects from the safety of their own homes. The laying of wreaths by a small representative group was to be live streamed. However, following the lockdown announcement by the Government, mayor cllr Mike Sutton confirmed to town councillors at last night’s meeting that the reduced service could no longer go ahead.

Instead, he said that presentations had been filmed which will be available on both the 8th and 11th November, on the town council website, where people can follow the services at home. “We do not have much option,” he said.

The mayor gave public thanks to Bill Prior of the Westbury branch of the Royal British Legion, who has organised the town’s poppy appeal for decades. “We should record our thanks for all the work he has done in the past,” he said.

Before the meeting, councillors observed two minutes’ silence to remember all the people who lost their lives in the First and Second World Wars, and all subsequent armed conflict across the globe.