The second Sunday in September is kept special by the fire services of the UK [and the Isle of Man and Channel Islands] as this is when, in 1940, the blitz on the UK really began in 1940. The Fire Service was then in the front line, which remained on UK soil until the last V2 landed in London just a few days before the German surrender in 1945.
I have had the honour of being a Trustee of the fine bronze memorial, by St Paul's Cathedral, for over 24 years. I will be proud this midday to march one more from our annual church service to the memorial, where a wreath laying will take place.
Representatives, including standard bearers, will be there from fire services across the country. We now remember all firefighters who have given their lives in the course of their duties. Sadly, again, there will be present the family of a firefighter who died on service in the past year. For his family there will be strong fellow-feeling from all the past and present firefighters, whose families have had the daily awareness that when they went to work today they may never return home.
Mercifully, the Grenfell Tower cost the fire service no lives as the London Fire Brigade saved dozens of people from the appalling fate that befell at least eighty of their neighbours. The news coverage of that event showed the risks that the service takes, in less spectacular circumstances, every day. The living, the surviving and the dead of this great service deserve the honour that will be paid to them today.
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