80th Anniversary of Victory in Europe and Victory over Japan

Lord Sentamu Excerpts

Friday 9th May 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Sentamu (CB)]

My Lords, I too congratulate the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Peterborough on her marvellous speech, especially as it focused on children. I also want to thank the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, for his wide-ranging speech; as the opening batsman, he scored 100 not out.

On VE Day and VJ Day, I was a child not yet conceived, but when I was five years old, I met my Uncle Sam. He sat me down and told me that he and my other uncle, called Fred, were members of the King’s African Rifles, East African Command. They went to war, to Burma, as it was then, in a very big company from Kenya, Uganda, and Tanganyika. They joined other companies from the rest of colonial Africa. Then, he abruptly walked away, but I did not move.

My uncle returned nearly an hour later and continued: “Your Uncle Fred was shot in a fierce battle. We buried him in a grave in Burma. It took a very long time to get all of us who were not killed back to our different barracks. The images of the fierce battle in which your Uncle Fred was killed still haunt me. I get nightmares, which are terrifying”. He got up and went for a long walk in the family banana groves, which were extensive—17 acres in total.

My mum told me: “Uncle Sam is not well. He has never been violent, but his thought patterns often get jumbled up and he cannot focus on one thing. The short conversation he just had with you is the best we have heard since he returned. He takes some medicine daily. When he does not, he is really sad, and we need to keep our eye on him. He lives 40 miles away with your Auntie Zepora, and it is terrifying when he goes missing for periods of time. The war in Burma knocked a big chunk of his memory out”.

I will stop there, instead of telling more of the effects of the war in Burma on my Uncle Sam. We know now, of course, that the country was called not Burma but Myanmar; but the British could not get their tongues around Myanmar. What still surprises me, though, is the failure of the Colonial Office to erect memorials in all the African countries for the veterans of the King’s African Rifles. As we heard from the noble Lord, Lord Boateng, the best memorial is always local, because it teaches people lessons that are not from a long distance.

It is indeed right and proper for us to celebrate 80 years since the war ended, and the victory that came with it. As we celebrate, let us hear clearly the message from Sir Edward Elgar in his cello concerto which addressed the futility of war. The way in which Jacqueline du Pré played it sends that message loud and clear; as the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley of Knighton, knows, I am the proud owner of a personally signed copy of that album.

To respond to violence with more violence increases darkness on a night devoid of stars. May we all be instruments of peace and justice, lovers of peace, because our world desperately needs this. The men and women we remember today did not die in vain. Their memory is calling us to hold the torch of peace. Their blood cries to us for peace and justice. Let us do it, and let us do it now.