| Main Performers | Reverend H R L 'Dick' Sheppard - speaker |
| Set List | 'God Save the King' (The National Anthem),
Hymn: 'O Valiant Hearts',
Prayers and Address (Sheppard),
Hymn: 'When I Survey The Wondrous Cross',
'Last Post',
Declaration,
'Reveille',
Hymn: 'For All The Saints',
Hymn: 'Praise, My Soul, the King of Heaven',
'Hallelujah Chorus' from Messiah, Handel |
| Performance Notes | In 1925, Christian pacifist, Dick Sheppard famously wrote to The Times newspaper in protest against a Victory Ball in the Royal Albert Hall planned for the evening of Armistice Day:
"Dancing is frequently the obvious and fitting form of gratefully commemorating a glad event, but a fancy dress ball on a vast scale as a tribute to the Great Deliverance which followed on the unspeakable agony of 1914-1918 seems to me not so much irreligious as indecent". Sheppard, who had been chaplain to a military hospital in France during the war, argued that balls and similar "thoughtless and ill-conceived" celebrations in hotels and restaurants "should not be encouraged, at least while this generation retains the heartache of a tender and thankful remembrance".
The Times was inundated with letters agreeing or denouncing Sheppard as a killjoy. One contributor, described as "Company Commander", argued that, as the sole survivor of four brothers, "the last thing that they would wish is that they should stand in the way of our enjoying ourselves". But another contributor, Roger Lawrence, agreed with Sheppard, saying a fancy dress ball was "grotesque" and a "piece of vulgarity".
The popular press, sensing the value of the controversy, took it further. The Daily Mail campaigned for the balls to end for fear of offending the bereaved. It claimed upper-class socialites, some of whom had not served, were enjoying themselves at the expense of the fallen. However, the Daily Express, engaged in a sales war with its rival, championed the rights of veterans to have a good time and re-live their camaraderie, having risked their lives in war. The Archbishops of Canterbury and York took the same position as the Mail.
Such a stir was created that the Ball's organiser, Lord Northampton, gave in to the appeals and the Ball was postponed to 12 November. For the 11 November a service of remembrance 'In Memory' was held conducted by Sheppard and existing ticket holders could attend in the presence of the King, the Prime Minister and other national figures.
Later he scribbled on his own copy of the programme, "Of course Pacifism must be written into this". That is the origin of the Festival of Remembrance now held annually at the Royal Albert Hall on the evening before Remembrance Sunday but, with its drills and displays, probably to Sheppard seems to have more of militarism than pacifism written into it. |
| Related Archival Material | Programme (RAHE/1/1925/43),
Poster (RAHE/2/1925/) |