Keeping the Standards flying
Published Sunday 10th July 2005
![The parade of standards forms up in Horseguards, London, for National Commemoration Day, 10 July 2005 [Picture: Alison Lea]](fetch-83.dll)
The parade of standards forms up in Horseguards, London, for National Commemoration Day, 10 July 2005 [Picture: Alison Lea]
Despite the heat and the toll that time has taken on some of them over 60 years, the standard bearers got the loudest cheers of the day as they marched proudly down The Mall.
In step behind the Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh, the veterans carried standards of the Royal Navy, the Army, the Air Force and the Bevan Boys.
There were also standards representing all those who'd played their part in the war from the Merchant Navy to St John’s Ambulance. In all, over 700 standards were on parade. Click here for a complete list of the standards and their bearers.
They were all kept in step by the massed bands of all three services. One veteran proudly carrying an RAF standard found the pace a bit too much �?but made his own way along the Mall and got a special cheer all of his own.
Then the crowds were allowed to follow on behind, and exactly as they had done on VE Day 60 years ago, assembled in front of the palace.
After a few moments, the Queen appeared and the flypast of historic aircraft marked the culmination of the commemoration. The crowd cheered formations of vintage planes, including two B-17 Flying Fortresses, then there was a pause before the final act �?the flypast of the Lancaster bomber of the Battle of Britain Flight, flanked as ever by its Hurricane and Spitfire escort.
As the bomber passed over the palace, its bomb bay opened and there was a gasp of delight as the roar of its Merlin engines was replaced by the ghostly fluttering of a million poppies falling gently on the crowd below.
Click here for a poster which details all the aircraft which took part in the flypast and their history. [File size 3Mb]
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