styles of official mourning

From 2006:

Among the more high-profile supporters of the appeal are the newsreaders on the major channels, most - if not all - of whom pin a poppy to a lapel.

At the BBC, there is no policy on poppy-wearing, it is a personal decision. A spokeswoman says that most do wear one, generally from 31 October until 13 November.

This year:

Organisations like the BBC usually choose a day for presenters to start wearing one. This year it was from 6am on 24 October.

Not so voluntary now, and earlier too. All the politicians suddenly started sprouting poppies at the same time too. I suppose the next stage will be having them officially issued early to significant personages, because, you see, they care more and earlier. Meanwhile, every moderately efficient PA has the appropriate unveiling date marked in the desk diary, somewhere between “wipe nose” and “change nappies”.

Comments

[Richard J]

It's not a coincidence, I think, that direct experience of WWI is about to slip out of living memory.

Dan Todman's book (you all read his blog, right?) on the subject of the Great War and Modern Memory is good on the topic.

[ajay]

By contrast, in the 1920s it was unheard of to wear your poppy before Armistice Day itself.
My source on this is Dorothy Sayers' "The Unpleasantness at the Bellona Club"

(SPOILER)

in which a key point is that General Fentiman, discovered dead just after the two minutes' silence, was not wearing his poppy, and therefore must have died the previous day; because it was unthinkable that he could have gone out on the streets on Armistice Day without his poppy, but quite normal for him to have not been wearing it the day before...

[ejh]

Blimey.