To begin with, as prime minister of the United Kingdom, Sir Winston Churchill rallied the British people during WWII, and led his country from the brink of defeat to victory. Let us introduce our artcile with a well-known Winston Churchill’s quotation: “Never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few.”
World War II also known as the Second World War was a global war that lasted from 1939 to 1945, although related conflicts began earlier. It involved the majority of the world’s countries including obviously all of the great powers. The world was split in two parts. Actually we can consider there were two opposing military alliances that is to say: the Allies and the Axis. It was the most widespread war in history, and directly involved more than one hundred million people from over thirty countries. In a state of total war, the major participants threw their entire economic, industrial, and scientific capabilities behind the war effort, erasing the distinction between civilian and military resources.
The world split in two parts : one the one hand, the Allies, on the other hand the Axis
Therefore we can say that World War II was one of the turning points in British History. Indeed, almost every family in the United Kingdom was hurt mentally and physically by the war in some way. Unlike plenty of conflicts, WWII directly involved the citizenry through the Battle of Britain and The Blitz which is the German word for ‘lightning’, was applied by the British press to the tempest of heavy and frequent bombing raids carried out over Britain in 1940 and 1941. This concentrated, direct bombing of industrial targets and civilian centers began with heavy raids on London on September 7, 1940 during what became known as the Battle of Britain.
As a consequence, the British people stood firm against his enemies for his convictions this is the reason why we cannot deal with the British citizen involvement without working on his resilience. All of them had only one desire: to live in peace. They expected impatiently the end of the war in order to seeing their men coming back home.
Nowadays, there are several places where you can explore and discover the history of WWII and walk in the footsteps of those who struggled in WWII and led the country to freedom, since there are so many moments to remember in this awful period.
Thus we may wonder how did the Second World War require the citizen involvement and how did the British population pay a tribute to his soldiers?
We decided together to work on specific aspects of the war. First we focused on the citizen engagement during the WWII and then we highlighted the importance of the memory duty.
The British civilian population during World War Two was mobilized in a way never seen before, living in a heavily regulated society and coming under sustained attack from the enemy.
Otherwise the society had to adapt itself. Appears a society dreadfully marked by the imprint of violence in which the war is the only one worry.
Ration books were issued when food rationing came into force in January 1940. Imported items including meats, sugar, tea and coffee were divided equally between all adults and children. These goods arrived by merchant ship and were vulnerable to submarine attacks and blockades. Imported non-food items such as textiles, soap and petrol were also rationed.
The invasion scare of June-September 1940 caused all road and rail signposts and maps to be removed. A call for scrap metal to recycle into Spitfires resulted in the removal of decorative iron railings surrounding many civic spaces, and aluminum saucepans were collected by the million.
Public awareness was heightened by the protective sandbagging of public buildings and monuments, and the growth of allotments (3.5 million by 1943) in every spare area of playing field or village green. The pace of life was controlled by air raid alerts and all clears, as well as the enforcement of a war-long blackout.
Everywhere, home hront posters exhorted citizens to ‘Dig for Victory’, remember that ‘Careless Talk Costs Lives’, whereas others repeated Churchill’s phrase ‘Let us Go Forward Together’.
On June 4, 1940, during the early days of World War II, Winston Churchill made a powerful speech to the British Parliament where he appeals the British people’s resilience in the face of the Nazi onslaught.
The United Kingdom’s resilience in the face of the Nazi onslaught.
“We shall go on to the end, we shall fight in France, we shall fight on the seas and oceans, we shall fight with growing confidence and growing strength in the air, we shall defend our Island, whatever the cost may be, we shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills; we shall never surrender…”
It was Churchill’s stubborn resilience, and his ability to communicate it to the British people, that set the tone for British’s willingness to stand up to the evil aggression of the Nazi’s and their allies.
During World War II, the men went overseas to fight, and that’s why the women were upon to work in the factories to keep the country going. Many mothers left the home to come to the call of their country to serve. These mothers were applauded by our culture and became the symbol of patriotism of the highest order. During this time the government set up child care programs with federal funds and many companies set up stores and hair-cutting salons right in the industrial plants for the women’s convenience.
As previously stated, the initial reason for mothers joining the labor force was due to the war effort, which was very commendable. This was a time in history when people needed to pull together and do the work assigned to them without complaining. Everyone was relying on others to make the country moving forward. Actually we can notice there was a surge of solidarity and brotherhood.
Even if after the war was over, the government and the private sector banded together in an enormous propaganda campaign to get women to leave the work place and return to the home, women embody the citizen involvement. We can consider them as war heroes as well as the soldiers who served during the war and fought for their motherland.
The soldiers as well as the British people learned and improved their ability to face and fight through adversity, to overcome obstacles, and continue to work without giving up.
First, we decided to focus on British museums and also memorials for instance the Churchill Museum and Cabinet War Rooms located in London. The dangers of German bombers and V2 rockets forced many citizen of London into underground bomb shelters. The government had to seek the same shelter to conduct the war. Plans for an underground bunker for the government were developed as early as the 1920’s and the cabinet war rooms became operational on August 27, 1939, just one week before the invasion of Poland. Today the facilities are open and you can see where the wartime cabinet met. You can also view the private quarters of Churchill, although he seldom actually slept in the bunker.
Moreover one of the most important events in WWII was something almost no one knew about at the time: the cracking of the German Enigma code. Alan Turing and his team at Bletchley Park, working in total secrecy, managed to decrypt German secrets which gave the Allies a decisive advantage in the war. At Bletchley Park you can view original German Enigma machines as well as a reconstructed bombe machine which was used to decrypt German codes. Besides, those heroes have inspired some directors or writers for instance Morten Tyldum who directed the American historical drama movie The Imitation Game or still Andrew Hodges who wrote the biography Alan Turing: The Enigma.
Furthermore we discovered the Mercantile Marine Memorial. It was erected on November 5, 1955. The twenty-four thousand persons of the Merchant Navy and fishing fleets whose names are honored on the walls of this garden gave their lives for their country and have no grave but the sea. We can also notice the 23,831 names commemorated on the monument.
Designed as an extension to the WW1 Mercantile Marine memorial to the south a semi-circular sunken garden contains the names of almost 24,000 British seamen and fifty Australian seamen, all listed on the walls of the sunken garden. In the centre of the garden, there is a pool of bronze, engraved with a compass pointing north. The memorial incorporates two statues, one an officer and one a seaman of the Merchant Service, and seven allegorical figures in relief possibly representative of the seven seas.
Attached to the wall of the steps is a sort of User’s Guide to this memorial. It gives a ground plan and: “The names of the dead are to be found under the names of the ships in which they were serving. […] Respect this sanctuary which bears the names of true men lost at sea. Keep it clean and shipshape.”
Finally we can notice the British memory duty is more than a duty. Indeed it is a means for them to commemorate the admiration, the respect and the pride they feel for those who have fallen for their country. They truly have at heart to pay a tribute to the soldiers and those who were involved during that period.
Numerous of people died during the Second World War this is the reason why the next generations should understand that such awful event must not happen again.
In a nutshell, as we tried to explain you the history of the 20th century has consequences on our present and we are convinced that it will also influence our future and obviously the next generations. As a consequence our duty is to inform them of our past’s errors in order to avoiding the repetition. Indeed, they must not be repeated because war is the mother of woe, sorrow, grief and pain this is the reason why we should bear in mind the tragic events of the Second World War. It is our sadly infamous legacy. People should learn and understand the conflict’s dangers in order to be able to change the world.
As far as we are concerned, we look forward to making our dream come true that is to say making this world a better one. We would like to manage to share our legacy because we are convinced it had better communicate when there is an issue instead of threatening the enemy and thus, breaking the communication. As a consequence, it will generate a war with thousands of injured and dead victims which could have been avoided.
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There is the grave of one of the soldiers during WWII. We can recognize it thanks to the inscription “medal of honor”. This grave is based in Lorraine, France.
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