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Services to remember the war dead have been held in many different communities across the Western Isles.

 

This year marks the 100th anniversary of the start of WW1.

 

Over 300 people attended a wreath-laying ceremony at the Lewis War Memorial on Remembrance Sunday.

 

A two-minute silence was held at Cnoc nan Uan hill above the town of Stornoway

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Army, navy, RAF and merchant navy representatives were accompanied by coastguards, police and fire personnel as well as many youngsters from uniformed organisations and local schools in paying tribute to the fallen.

 

Earlier, members of represented organisations attended Remembrance services in churches in Stornoway.

 

A parade was also held through Stornoway town centre.

 

The Western Isles is said to have suffered a far greater loss of life per head of population in both world wars compared to any other community in the country.

 

In Lewis, some 17% of the 6,721 men who served in WW1 never returned.

 

The majority of islanders in WW1 died in land battles in France and Flanders. In WW2, most loss of life was at sea.

 

Many war memorials on Lewis mark the end of WW1 as 1919 and not the official date of November 1918 in homage to a cruel twist of fate which is still Britain's worst peacetime maritime disaster.

 

Some 205 returning navymen died when the Admiralty yacht HMY Iolaire crashed on rocks in a gale at the approaches to Stornoway harbour in the early hours of New Year’s Day 1919.

 

Servicemen who survived torpedoed ships perished on the Beasts of Holm, just yards from safety.

Only 79 made it ashore alive in the horrific accident.

 

 

 

 

 

Remembrance Sunday services take place        9/11/14

Senior Nicolson Institute pupils lay a wreath at the Lewis War Memorial