Remembrance Day 11th November

There are faces you grow used to seeing in an old inn. Some belong to the people who come through the door each week. Others look down from photographs and portraits, quietly becoming part of the place.

Ted Banks, whose portrait hangs in our middle bar, is one of those faces.

On 11th November, he is a reminder to look a little closer. Behind every portrait is a person, and behind every name remembered are families, friendships and lives that reached far beyond a uniform.

Remembering our own

Remembrance is a national occasion, but it is also deeply local. It belongs to our villages and valleys, to the families who waited for news, and to the service personnel who came home carrying experiences that weren’t always easy to speak about.

We remember those who lost their lives, while also thinking of veterans, those still serving and the families whose lives have been shaped by service.

A place for stories

As the fourth generation of our family to look after this inn, I’m very conscious that we’re only part of its story. "A blip in the passing of time," I am quite often heard saying!! An inn dating back to 1307 has been a meeting place through centuries of change, and much of its history belongs to the people who have passed through its doors. Some stories are written down. Others survive because somebody remembers a relative, recognises a photograph or shares a few words across the bar. Those everyday conversations matter so keep them going. They help the next generation understand that history isn’t only about dates and distant events. It is about people from places like ours.

Grandma Betty Barrett and Beaumont Brothers

There is a wartime story in our own family that deserves remembering locally too.

During the war, the family owned a haulage company called Beaumont Brothers, (more blog to come about this) which was instrumental in transporting ammunition. Behind that operation were family members taking on responsibilities that, in other circumstances, might never have fallen to them so young.

Grandma Betty was made to leave school and work in the office, heading up a major operation alongside some of her siblings. School life was put behind her, and in its place came the responsibility of helping to keep an essential wartime business moving. For any of us who remember her, that explains a lot about the grit she had. Betty had been expected to get on with a demanding job from a young age, and that determination stayed with her and was most likely the reason she worked here at the pub until she was 94, well, that and the copious amounts of ale she sneakily helped herself to - we saw it as payment for her years of service though haha!

Her story is a reminder that the war effort reached far beyond the front line. It changed lives at home, too, asking young people to grow up quickly and shoulder responsibilities they hadn’t chosen. On Remembrance Day, we think of those contributions as well.

A moment to pause

At eleven o’clock on the eleventh day of the eleventh month, the two-minute silence offers something simple and important: time to stop.

Time to remember those who did not return, to recognise the service of those who did, and to think of the families behind them.

This Remembrance Day, our thoughts are with local service personnel, veterans and their loved ones. Your family members and our family members. It's a reminder not to forget.

We will remember them.