Join us to mark Armistice Day at the hospital which is a memorial to local men who gave their lives serving their country.
A short service will be held at the memorial stone outside the reception door at 11am on Friday November 11.
Hospital Friends will lay a wreath alongside the Royal British Legion, whose standard bearer will also be present along with a member of the clergy and a bugler. Staff also attend, and any patients well enough, but members of the public are also welcome.
Our hospital was built just after the First World War and opened in 1921 in honour of the 99 servicemen from the town and another 80 from surrounding villages who died in the conflict.
Armistice Day is a chance to salute them, and any other loved ones who served.
Scaled down but poignant Armistice Day 2020
Our community hospital dedicated to soldiers lost in battle held a small Armistice Day service in their honour.
The annual event was scaled down to a handful of people due to lockdown restrictions.
But organisers were determined it should go ahead to remember the sacrifice of 99 men from the town and another 80 from surrounding villages who gave their lives fighting for their country in the First World War.
Hospital Friends group chairman Keith Jarvis said: “We were pleased to hold the service in honour of the soldiers the hospital is a memorial too, as well as others who have given their lives serving their country. It was a small but poignant gathering but we hope to revert to a larger scale service next year.”
He joined North Walsham church ordinand Jo Haywood, Salvation Army bugler Ian Richardson, and two Royal British Legion representatives – deputy-chairman and standard bearer Bill McIvor and secretary Sheila Mitchell, for the short service.
Prayers included one for the foundation of the 24-bed hospital in memory of those who suffer through war, and for its current patients – who, following a recent temporary change of role for the unit – are all people recovering from Covid.
War Memorial Hospital hosts fitting start to Armistice Day events
North Walsham’s War Memorial Hospital was the fitting venue for the first of the town’s five services marking the centenary of Armistice Day.
Hospital Friends were joined by the Royal British Legion, Army and Air Training Corps cadets, councillors including the mayor Barry Hester, hospital staff and supporters for a 9.30am service and wreath-laying led by the vicar the Rev Paul Cubitt.
Paul Watts from the Cromer and Sheringham Band was the bugler.
The original hospital was built in 1924 in memory of the 99 men who lost their lives in the Great War.
Also on display was a replica Red Cross fIag as a reminder of the two auxiliary hospitals which were set up temporarily in the town to nurse injured soldiers from the 1914-18 conflict. Two flags have been recreated, to go on display at the hospital and church, through a joint initiative this year by the Friends and the vicar.
Armistice ceremony’s 100-year-old VIP visitor
A centenarian army veteran was among those marking Armistice Day at North Walsham War Memorial Hospital.
Stanley Puddifoot, 100, from Salhouse, who is a patient at the hospital, served six years with the Royal Artillery and the Chindits special forces in Burma and India.
He was wheeled from the ward to join Saturday’s silence and ceremony at the hospital, which is a memorial to 99 men from the town, and another 80 from surrounding villages.
The ceremony was led by the vicar of North Walsham the Rev Paul Cubitt, and was attended by guests including the Royal British Legion, hospital League of Friends and the town council.
