What is Remembrance Day and when is it observed?

Remembrance Day is observed on November 11 each year to honour Canadians who died or served in war and military operations. The date marks the moment the First World War armistice took effect: the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month, in 1918. Veterans Affairs Canada coordinates a national ceremony at the National War Memorial in Ottawa, attended by the Governor General, the Prime Minister, the Silver Cross Mother, and members of the diplomatic corps.

Parliament made the day a federal statutory holiday under the Armistice Day Act of 1921, originally pairing it with Thanksgiving. The two were separated in 1931 when the name changed to Remembrance Day and the date was fixed permanently to November 11. Federal employees and the people of six provinces and three territories receive the day off; Ontario, Quebec, Manitoba, and Nova Scotia leave it as a non-statutory observance.

The two-minute silence at 11:00 a.m. is the centrepiece of every ceremony. Trumpeters play the Last Post before the silence and Reveille after it, and the Act of Remembrance from Laurence Binyon's poem 'For the Fallen' is recited: 'They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old.' Cadet corps, Royal Canadian Legion branches, and schools across the country hold parallel ceremonies, and many Canadians wear a red poppy on their left lapel from late October until November 11.

Canada has lost more than 118,000 service members in conflicts since Confederation, including roughly 66,000 in the First World War, 45,000 in the Second World War, 516 in Korea, and 158 in Afghanistan. Remembrance Day asks every Canadian, including new citizens, to acknowledge that price.