Torches at The Tower of London

To mark the centenary of the Armistice at the end of the First World War the Tower of London filled the moat with 10,000 torches.

At the start of the war, Foreign Secretary Sir Edward Grey famously declared 'The lamps are going out all over Europe.'  This commemorative exercise represents the moment they came back on again - along with the grief of those who survived to rebuild a shattered world.

It was called 'Beyond The Deepening Shadow: The Tower Remembers' with a floodlit bungler on the roof of the Middle Tower playing the Last Post and a minute's silence - which was incredibly moving.
Then a small processing of Yeomen Wardens - better known as Beefeaters - plus the Constable and the Govenor of the Tower formed a guard of honour and the first of the torches was ignited by a tri-service trio.  Then out of the shadows, a small battalion of volunteer torch-lighters emerged in pairs.  Each night, about a hundred of them have the task of illuminating half a mile of grass-covered moat.  Each pair consisted of a 'leader' with a magnetic wand who lifts the metal cover off each torch followed by a 'lighter' who carried a blowtorch on the end of a rod. Each has been issued with a flame-retardant grey boiler suit (to blend in with the Tower's stonework) and had undergone several hours of training - not just to tick all the health and safety boxes but to ensure they lit their designated 'zone' of torches in the correct order.  It has all been planned in minute detail by Tom Piper, the designer of the installation.


Despite the scale of the exercise, it took only about 20 minutes before the whole moat was ablaze.

The whole experience took place to the sound of a specially-commissioned choral work recorded by sound artist Mira Calix.  Called 'One Lighted Look For Me,' it's based on a line from the war poem, Sonnet to a Soldier by Mary Borden, who wrote it while working in a field hospital on the Somme.

Smoke wafted over the scene, although this was actually dry ice used for theatrical effect as the torches use smokeless fuel so do not give off any smoke, fumes or smell.





This was a unique and very special occasion, and I felt very privileged to have seen it.