Ten OMs and Four OM wives set out early on the morning of Tuesday 12^th May to answer Siegfried Sassoon’s searing question in Aftermath: “Have you forgotten yet?”

Members of the party at Hill 62 on the Ypres Salient: Left to right (standing): Peter Eyres (LI 1961-65); Bill Buxton (C1 1953-57); Tony Foley (CR 1983-2008); Anthony Tanner (LI 1953-57); Chris Rogers (CR 1974-90); Clifford Allison (SU 1966-70); Tim Tennant (C3 1968-73); Corisande Tennant; Sue Rogers; Martin Evans (CR 1968- Club Secretary); Anthony Spender (PR 1953-57); Mary Spender; David Faulder (B1 1971-75). Left to right (sitting/kneeling) Sarah Tanner; David Du Croz (CR 1996-2007, Group Leader); Martin Pick (CO 1957-62); [absent for the day: James Hopper (C1 1957-62)].

On 13th May, the party was honoured by the Last Post Society and Clifford Allison (SU 1966-70), whose father served as an officer both at Ypres and later on the Somme, was invited to give the exhortation which begins, "They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old...", at the Menin Gate.

The highlight of the trip was the dedication of a plaque in St George’s (Ypres) to those OMs who died in the war, and the laying of a wreath at the Last Post ceremony at the Menin Gate. The tour of the sites began at Talbot House in Poperinghe after lunch at “Ginger’s” on the Tuesday, and finished at the Australian Memorial at Villers-Bretonneux on the Saturday morning en route back to Calais. In between we visited Tyne Cot, Vimy Ridge and Thiepval, as well as many lesser sites equally poignant in their own way, and heard the moving personal stories of the relatives of four of our company at the places where those stories were played out.

Now we can all with a clear conscience “look up and swear by the green of the spring that we’ll never forget”.

Bill Buxton (C1 1953-57) and Anthony Tanner (LI 1953-57) laying the wreath at the Menin Gate in memory of the 747 Boys, Beaks and Staff from Marlborough College who died in The Great War.