While there have been two previous articles about this event, one on the website and the other in the May edition of London Roar, we would like to draw your further attention to what is going to be a most memorable and moving occasion to mark the 100th Anniversary of the end of the First World War and to honour those members of the Club who died fighting for the Country. Of the 194 members who fought, 50 died - more than 25% of them. The impact of the War on those people’s families and friends and on the lives of the others who fought but survived and their families and friends must have been enormous and lasted for years.
Demand for tickets is proving to be high. So far, there have been requests from more than forty people to reserve places. If you have not yet registered your interest in coming, please will you send an email to Miles Preston (one of the members of the sub-committee that has been working on the lunch and producing a booklet summarising the lives, including rowing careers, of the fifty who were lost). Miles’s email address is miles.preston@milespreston.co.uk.
The booklet will be a very fitting record of the fifty who lost their lives. We have been able to find photographs of over three quarters of these members, along with colour photographs of headstones in War cemeteries and names on memorials. Everyone attending the Lunch on the 7th November will be given a copy of the booklet.
2nd Baron Ampthill, President of LRC during the First World War
The event will consist of a short service (approximately fifteen minutes) at 12.30 pm in the Fairbairn Room followed by drinks and a three course meal in the Long Room. The new vicar of St. Mary’s , Putney, the Reverend John Whittaker, will conduct the Service and a World War 1 authority, Ruaraidh Adams-Cairns, will be giving us a talk for fifteen to twenty minutes towards the end of the meal about the War and a few of the members who died. Tickets will cost £50 a head.
On the 31st August, we shall be sending emails to everyone who has, by then, indicated a wish to come to the lunch. Attached to the email will be a booking form. You should complete and return your booking form and pay for your ticket(s) as soon as possible. Each member coming may buy tickets for up to three guests.
A week later, on the 7th September, we shall be emailing the rest of the Club inviting attendance at the lunch on a first come, first served basis. We very much hope that you will come to what we believe will be an historic occasion in the Club’s life. This is an event for all members.
Amiens in August 1918 – major turning point in the War
