Town memorials.

Are interesting in what they suggest of different national character. Travelling through France it was clear that the memorials were more prominent around the old battlefields. Frence memorials also depict 'France' as the object of the soldiers sacrifice, something much less common on British memorials (I can't remember one with 'Brittania' as the main subject). The personal bouquets and memorials on the French town memorials were also striking.

A selection for you ...

Bapaume:

 A cotswolds (UK) memorial - with St George slaying a dragon. Always good at the moment to remember St George was a Syrian.

 Deal in Kent, a town very linked to military service over many centuries:

And back to France to finish - a memorial of the Franco Prussian War (The Prequel to WW1):

 

Travelling around WW1 battlefields, or, frankly, any battlefields, or almost anywhere, there are reminders of the constancy of conflict in human existance. I enjoy the histroy, and the development of strategy and tactics as each new innovation in weapon or armour or fortification comes.

But how sad it is that since classical times we have not learned. A fellow blogger quoted:

 A Greek historian, Thucydides, wrote a history of an epic conflict in the mid 5th Century BC. In his introduction he explained his reason for writing his detailed account - so that mankind could read and learn about these barbaric events, and avoid ever going to war again.
His laudable purpose was immeasurably unsuccessful of course, as war is now, and always has been, a murderous constant in human experience.
 (http://omg-occasionalmuffledgrunts.blogspot.co.uk/2014/11/how-non-violence-remembrance-is-possible.html)

I enjoyed walking around the Paris Gate at Cambrai - a symbol of previous conflicts. We pointed out the portcullis slots, and murder holes - indeed, we are clever at maiming and killing one another!