The cannons of World War I were barely silenced when Canadians began looking for ways to honour their war dead. One of the most touching commemorative efforts is also among the least conspicuous. The Memorial Chamber of Books of Remembrance are in the Center Block in the Peace Tower of the Parliament Buildings.
They name 116,031 Canadians who died while serving in military
campaigns outside Canada. The chamber was opened by the Prince of Wales on Aug. 3, 1927. It occupies the second level of the Peace Tower and attracts more than 500,000 visitors annually.
The Books of Remembrance, now one each for World War I, World War II, Merchant Navy, Korean War,the Nile expedition, and the Province of Newfoundland, rest on six altars. In 2005, a seventh book, In Service of Canada, was dedicated listing members of the Canadian forces who have died since the close of the Second World War book.
The poppies sold for Remembrance day recall the poppy fields of Flanders, a historic region now in parts of Belgium, France, and The Netherlands. They are eulogized in Canadian physician John McCrae's poem "In Flanders Field," which begins "In Flanders field the poppies blow/Between
the crosses, row on row."