Red Poppies will feature in Seymour Square alongside Stihl Shop Garden Fête

A memorial service will be held at the Blenheim War Memorial clock tower at 11.00 am on Sunday, 11 November to mark Armistice Day.

Seymour Square will also be the site of this year’s Stihl Shop Garden fete but the organisers of each event have worked together to ensure the public space is shared.

“We acknowledge the importance of the day to our returned soldiers and we will be making sure the band playing at the fete put their instruments aside when the clock strikes 11.00 am,” said Garden Marlborough President Frank Metcalfe.

Marlborough RSA president Ernie Thomson and vice president Peter Slape hope that, with such a big crowd in Seymour Square, it will be a chance for more people than usual to take a moment to observe Armistice Day.

About 50 people usually attend the Armistice Day ceremony at the base of the war memorial clock tower at the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month - the symbolic moment chosen to remember the cease to WW1 hostilities on the Western Front in 1918.

A traditional wreath of red poppies is laid, a reminder of the wild poppies that grew across the fields of Flanders where so many Allied troops lost their lives in the First World War.

Marlborough Mayor Alistair Sowman and RSA vice president John Forrest will each give short addresses.