Veterans Day’s roots in World War I: Why Nov. 11 remains sacred | Opinion

Veterans Day honors those men and women who have donned the uniform in service to the nation.

Yet, November 11^th has somber origins as it signifies the armistice which halted the carnage of World War I, once called the “Great War” or “War to End All Wars.” After five failed German offensives beginning in March 1918, negotiations between the allies (France, Great Britain and the United States) and the German high command settled on a truce to commence on the 11^th hour of the 11^th day of the 11^th month in 1918.

After the notifications, the trench lines between the opposing forces awaited the appointed hour. The German forces merely hunkered down. However, allied commanders took various measures leading up to 11 AM. Some commanders ordered their men to sit in their positions while others just  lobbed artillery shells at the German lines.

Combat veteran Lowell Horn of Port St. John was among the veterans attending. The 2024 annual Veterans Day Ceremony was held at the Brevard Veterans Memorial Center in Merritt Island on Monday morning, in partnership with the Brevard Veterans Council. An estimated 300 people attended that included several military organizations, prayers, guest speakers, and patriotic music. (TIM SHORTT / FLORIDA TODAY)

Inexplicably, some ordered charges across no-man’s land to gain more terrain before the cease fire. It was a bloody morning with 11,000 casualties and 3,000 killed in numbers exceeding the daily rate for the war. The loss was 10% higher than the allied casualties suffered on D-Day 26 years later. The last American to die was Henry Gunther of Baltimore, Maryland who fell only a few seconds before 11 AM. The irony is tragic. The men on D-Day were storming the beaches to win; on Armistice Day men died for a war already decided.

It is nigh impossible for those of us so far removed from 1918 to understand the emotion that welled up in the aftermath of the four year conflagration. On average 2,250 men were killed daily and another 5,000 wounded.

For the entire war there were 8 million military dead and 21 million wounded. Civilian deaths totaled 6 million. France lost 11% of its population killed and wounded; Great Britain 8%; Germany 9% and the U.S. 0.37%. America lost nearly 117,000 killed in only 19 months of fighting. One in every five West Pointers deployed to France died. By 1918 France had 600,000 widows and 1 million fatherless children. In 1914 the English population was growing at a rate of 10.4%; in 1918 it was 4.7%. By 1921 there were 55 British women for every 45 men in the marriage age group of 20-39.

Perhaps the best visual to understand the magnitude of the loss can be depicted in a manner described by Joseph H. Persico in his book, “11^th Hour, 11^th Day, 11^th Month, Armistice Day 1918.”  If we stood at the Ron Jon Surf Shop in Cocoa Beach at 9 AM Monday morning and watched the spirits of the dead British walk by four abreast, the column would stretch 97 miles and take 20 hours to pass our position. If the dead French followed, it would take an additional 51 hours and the trailing Germans another 59 hours. Considering all the dead, the column would stretch nearly 386 miles or the distance from Paris to halfway through Switzerland or New York City to Cleveland.

The British are credited with the idea of commemorating Armistice Day. On November 17, 1919 King George V proclaimed henceforth at “the 11^th hour of the 11^th day of the 11^th month, there may be for a brief space of two minutes a complete suspension of our normal activities.”

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