Peace at Last

What happened on the last day of the Great War? Each year since, we have marked the end of the war with tributes and remembrance, solemnity and respect. But as Peace at Last reveals, the first Armistice Day in 1918 was entirely unprecedented and extraordinary. Upon hearing the news of the peace, crowds of people took to the streets, scaled statues, burnt effigies on bonfires, and ran riot as joy and relief swept through the British population and the wider world. Drawing on news reports, literature, memoirs, and letters, Cuthbertson brings to the fore the full strangeness of the day—its celebratory, wild atmosphere—and the experiences of ordinary people as well as soldiers and prominent figures like D. H. Lawrence, Robert Graves, and David Lloyd George. Cuthbertson takes us from midnight to midnight—from when the Armistice was signed to the removing of black paint from streetlamps, flooding cities with light. Peace at Last is the compelling portrait of one of the most important days in history—an exciting and inspiring moment which has, until now, remained relatively unknown.