Remembrance Day

Today I went to the smallest of the three Remembrance Sunday events we hold in Hackney - one for each of the three former boroughs of Hackney, Shoreditch and Stoke Newington - in the vestibule of Stoke Newington library.

It is a very short and simple ceremony - the main civic service is held at St John's Church in Hackney - with a wreath being laid by the Council's Deputy Speaker, representatives of the other political groups on the Council, and the local Air Cadets, who then parade past the old Stoke Newington Town Hall.

On the wall is a war memorial which, for WW1 alone, lists over 1,000 names of Stoke Newington residents who died.

Above the door to the library is a short inscription which reads:

"All ye who pass in quest of happy hours,
Behold the price at which those hours were bought."