Students and soldiers fanned out across St. Albert this week to make sure that there were no headstones left alone for Remembrance Day.
Students from Lorne Akins Junior High and Bertha Kennedy Catholic teamed up with soldiers from the Edmonton Garrison to place poppies on military graves Thursday as part of the national No Stone Left Alone campaign.
Some 350 Edmonton students and soldiers took part in the campaign’s main ceremony at Edmonton’s Beechmount Cemetery, which features some 4,184 military graves.
Edmonton’s Maureen Bianchini-Purvis started the No Stone Left Alone campaign in 2011 as a way to help youths honour those who died in war.
Starting with just one cemetery in Edmonton, the event has now grown to cover about 71 cemeteries in Alberta, B.C. and Manitoba, and includes all the war graves in Edmonton, Bianchini-Purvis said. About 19,000 poppies will be placed on war graves this year as part of the initiative.
“I’m so proud of Canada and Canadians that they recognize the need for this.”
With the recent deaths of two soldiers in Ontario and Quebec and the 100th anniversary of the start of the First World War, people seem more determined than ever to honour our soldiers this year, Bianchini-Purvis said.
St. Albert Legion president Bob Fagan led a delegation to the city’s municipal cemetery by Poundmaker’s Lodge as part of the campaign, placing poppies on about 57 grave markers there.
“We have a field of honour in the cemetery out there,” Fagan said, and he felt that the Legion should do something this year for those buried in it.
This was the first year that the St. Albert Legion had taken part in this event, and Fagan hoped to make it an annual tradition.
“Without them, we wouldn’t have the freedom we do now,” he said of the soldiers.
“We owe so much to those that gave so much.”
The Lorne Akins students held a moment of silence at Holy Cross Cemetery Thursday morning before laying a wreath at the memorial in the cemetery’s field of honour. They then slowly walked the rows of headstones to find the roughly 40 military graves and placed a poppy on each.
Some paused to reflect as they did so. At least one girl appeared to be in tears from the experience.
Student Henry Bordian had a grandfather who fought in the Second World War, and said it was important to remember the sacrifices of those who fought.
“If they hadn’t fought, we might not even exist.”
About 26 Bertha Kennedy students placed poppies upon graves at the Mission Hill cemetery.
One of those graves was that of Francis Kastelan, a mechanic with the Canadian army in the Second World War and father of Bertha Kennedy teacher Dolores Andressen.
Andressen said her father didn’t talk much about the war, but did tell her about the blackouts that engulfed London when the city turned out its lights to hide from bombers.
“He didn’t actually want to go and fight, but he did it for his country.”
Putting a poppy on a grave might be a symbolic act, but it helps make the wars of the past real for today’s youth, Andressen said.
“It keeps the memory alive for the next generation.”
Students who write to the foundation about their experiences in this event often speak about how seeing the names on the gravestones changes them, Bianchini-Purvis said.
“They’re not just stones there. They were actual people, somebody’s dad, somebody’s mom.”
Funds raised by the No Stone Left Alone campaign go towards the Lord Strathcona’s Horse (Royal Canadians) Regimental Society and the Royal Canadian Legion, Bianchini-Purvis said.
Visit nostoneleftalone.com for details.
