This Sunday, November 11, 2018, will mark the passing of 100 years since the end of World War I—the “war to end all wars.” In 1918, on “the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month,” in a forest near the French city of Compiègne, French, British, and German leaders met and signed an armistice that officially ended a horrific conflict that claimed the lives of more than 16 million people over four years. Earlier this month, Emmanuel Macron, the president of France, inaugurated a series of commemorations of the centenary, combining messages of remembrance with warnings about the recent growth of nationalism in the world. Also, be sure to see the Fading Battlefields of World War I.
Preparing for the Centenary of the End of World War I
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The British artist Rob Heard stands among rows of 72,396 shrouded figures which form his piece of commemorative art "Shrouds of the Somme" to mark the upcoming centenary of the end of World War I, in Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park in London, on November 7, 2018. Each figure is a human form, individually shaped, shrouded and made to a name of the 72,396 missing British and Commonwealth servicemen who were killed fighting in the Somme area of France between July 1, 1916, and March 20, 1918, who have no known grave and whose names are engraved on the Thiepval Memorial in France. #
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Some of the 72,396 shrouded figures that form part of the "Shroud of the Somme" installation by the artist Rob Heard, placed in Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park, in Stratford, London, on November 7, 2018. #
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Captain James Pugh from the 1st Battalion of the Royal Anglian Regiment views some of the shrouded figures that form part of the "Shroud of the Somme" installation in London on November 7, 2018. #
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The remains of craters from World War I shelling, photographed below the Douaumont cemetery, as France prepares to mark the centennial commemoration of the First World War Armistice Day, near Verdun, on November 7, 2018. #
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This picture taken on November 6, 2018, shows graves at a cemetery situated between the psychiatric hospital and the current municipal cemetery, nicknamed the "cemetery of the forgotten" in Cadillac, southwestern France. On November 11, men who were interned during or after World War I in the psychiatric asylum will be honored during the centenary of the armistice celebration ceremony. The majority were interned from 1914 to 1919, but others were victims of post-traumatic disorders. Of the 565 soldiers listed from 1914 to 1925, 220 died in the establishment. #
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History enthusiasts, dressed in vintage army uniforms as Poilu (French soldiers in World War I), are pictured in Morhange, France, on November 5, 2018, prior to the start of a ceremony in tribute to the French soldiers killed in August 1914 during the battle at the border, as part of the celebrations of the centenary of the First World War. #
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A photo taken on October 20, 2018, shows Notre Dame de Paris Cathedral during a light show entitled "Dame de Coeur" as part of the First World War centennial celebrations. #
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A woman photographs the iconic poppy sculpture "Wave" as it opens at IWM North, its final presentation as part of 14-18 NOW's U.K.-wide tour of the poppies, on September 7, 2018, in Manchester, England. #
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The Weeping Window poppy installation, by the artist Paul Cummins and the designer Tom Piper, is pictured outside of the Imperial War Museum in London on October 31, 2018. Weeping Window is a cascade comprising several thousand handmade ceramic poppies seen pouring from a high location to the ground below. #
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A visitor looks at a dove-shaped formation of thousands of artificial red poppies, made out of red bottle tops, at the Botanic Garden in Meise, to mark the centenary of the end of the First World War in Belgium, on November 2, 2018. #
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A Chelsea pensioner, in his ceremonial uniform as a retired member of the British army, poses with 6 foot "Tommy" figures at the Royal Hospital Chelsea in London, for the "There But Not There" campaign to commemorate the upcoming centenary of the end of World War I, on October 16, 2018. #
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World War I trenches, photographed at the Main de Massiges battlefield between the Champagne and Argonne fronts, on ground that was taken and lost several times by French and German troops between September 1914 and September 1915, in Massiges, France, on November 6, 2018. #
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A damaged cannon is displayed in Belleau Wood behind the Aisne-Marne American Cemetery, dedicated to the U.S. soldiers killed in the battle of Belleau Wood during World War I, photographed on November 6, 2018. #
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A white rose, a French flag, and a U.S. flag sit placed in front of a tombstone at the World War I Meuse-Argonne American Cemetery and Memorial in Romagne-sous-Montfaucon, near Verdun, on November 6, 2018. #
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The body of an unknown Australian World War I soldier is laid to rest in Tyne Cot Military Cemetery on November 6, 2018, in Ypres, Belgium. Two Australian and one British unknown soldier were buried with full military honors during a commemoration service. The soldier of the Lancashire Fusiliers, who was killed in the battle of Passchendaele 101 years ago, was found lying next to his Australian comrades in what is believed to be a shell hole, during civil-engineering work on a road leading to the Tyne Cot Cemetery in May of 2016. #
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The remains of an unknown soldier, killed during World War I, unearthed during road-construction work near the battlefield of Douaumont, are seen during identification operations by the French emergency doctor and forensic pathologist Bruno Fremont, during an interview with Reuters at Verdun Hospital on November 5, 2018. #
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A wooden statue depicting a Poilu (French soldier in World War I) by the French artist Jean Bergeron is seen on the spot where the remains of 26 soldiers were discovered in 2013 in the destroyed village Fleury-devant-Douaumont, France, photographed on November 5, 2018. #
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A woman poses for a selfie at the "Never Again" poppy installation at Koenigsplatz in Munich, Germany, on November 5, 2018, as Europe prepares to mark the centenary of the ending of the First World War. #
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Images of poppies are projected onto the surfaces of the Nave of St. Albans Cathedral, forming part of a light and sound installation to commemorate the centenary of World War I, in St. Albans, England, on October 27, 2018. #
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A Yeoman Warder, commonly referred to as a "Beefeater," stands among thousands of lit flames that form part of an installation called "Beyond the Deepening Shadow: The Tower Remembers," in the dry moat of the Tower of London, to mark the centenary of the end of World War I, in London, on November 6, 2018. #
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Raindrops cover a photograph of Gerald Briedell of the Royal Irish Regiment who was killed in action on November 23, 1914, atop a cross placed in the Field of Remembrance at Westminster Abbey in preparation for the annual Armistice Day commemoration for the dead and injured military and civilians in conflicts around the world, on November 11, photographed on November 7, 2018. #
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