Free

Essential Information

Type Events and festivals
Location
Queen's House
Date and Times Sunday 17 November | 12pm-4pm
Prices Free

Join us at the Queen's House for an afternoon of talks and live performances to mark Remembrance Day.

In partnership with Matglen International Consulting, we invite you to remember the Armed Forces and their families, from Britain and the Commonwealth, through a mix of personal narratives and performances.

The reality of war has many different facets. Keynote speaker Ally Musthan will share his personal experiences and explore remembrance from a place where we can all freely share our thoughts and perceptions. 

Find out about the events taking place below.

Event schedule

Remembrance: A Call to Mind

12pm- 12.15pm | Outside the Queen's House

The commemorations will begin with a Reveille from Bugle Major, Sergeant Jake Pugsley.

Keynote speaker Ally Musthan will give a short speech introducing the day and the events coming up. This will be followed by a two minute silence.

Dance performance: A Celebratory Remembrance

12.25pm - 12.55 pm | Great Hall 

Watch a dance performance given by artist and educator Teal Darkenwald and students from Bird College. This includes a Josephine Baker inspired performance from dancer Regan Hutshell.

Bird College dancers: Bethany Anderson, James Ian Clark, JJ Garrix, Ellie-Mae Gough, Marlee Hancorn and Elliot Whitmore.

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About Teal Darkenwald

Teal Darkenwald (pictured) is an interdisciplinary artist, educator, and founder of Ultra Barre with a multifaceted background. Her choreography has been featured at Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM), New York Live Arts, and the Ailey Citigroup Theatre. She has directed and choreographed large-scale performances including site-specific and traditional shows, visual media, and industry entertainment in London, Paris, Hong Kong, and more. She is also an artistic associate and choreographer for BalaSole Dance Company in New York City, an organisation devoted to providing diverse, equitable, and inclusive performance experiences for dance artists. 

Darkenwald is a tenured Associate Professor of dance and biomechanics and Honors College Fellow at East Carolina University. There, she was awarded the University of North Carolina system for excellence in teaching in addition to numerous grants for her scholarship and teaching. 

Darkenwald is also pursuing a PhD in Dance Science at Trinity Laban Conservatoire of Music and Dance. Her scholarship includes creating choreography using emerging technologies, inertial motion capture, and virtual reality. Whilst on research leave in the UK, Darkenwald has taught contemporary dance, served as an academic tutor and performance enhancement tutor, and held research roles at Bird College, the University of Essex, and Trinity Laban. 

This is Darkenwald's second year creating the choreography for Royal Museums Greenwich's Remembrance celebrations.

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About Regan Hutsell

Regan Hutsell began her dance training at the age of four in Houston, Texas. In her formative years, she had the privilege of studying in a diverse range of disciplines.After attending the invitational week of the Rockettes Summer Intensive, Regan was subsequently hired at the age of eighteen to be a Radio City Rockette. While a Rockette, Regan was featured in the New York Post, Dance Spirit Magazine, and on NBC Nightly News. 

In 2021, Regan joined Birmingham Royal Ballet as an artist. Throughout her career at Birmingham Royal Ballet, she has had the opportunity to dance exciting roles such as Carabosse in Sleeping Beauty, Harlot in Romeo and Juliet, Spanish in Swan Lake and Snow Attendant in The Nutcracker. She has also danced in Ben Van Cauwenbergh’s Non, Je Ne Regrette Rien, William Tuckett’s Nisi Domini, Carlos Acosta’s The Dying Swans, Jorge García‘s Majisimo, and in Black Sabbath – The Ballet she originated the solo ‘In Ozzy’s Head’. 

Regan has also danced professionally with Ballet Rhode Island and Houston Contemporary Dance Company.

Film screening

TURNING POINT 

1pm – 3.45pm | Van de Velde Studio

Join us throughout the day to watch TURNING POINT, a film that highlights the experiences of individuals in Barbados and Jamaica after the First World War. 

The film contains performances by actors including Paterson Joseph (The Beach, Vigil, Noughts + Crosses), Suzette Llewellyn (Holby City, Eastenders, Surgical Spirit), Ashley D. Gayle and Veronica Beatrice Lewis, which are set against a backdrop of projected archive footage and a 3D soundscape of community participant voices.

TURNING POINT was created by Sweet Patootee Arts, a production company that uses oral testimony and archive sources to inspire interdisciplinary storytelling for the arts, learning, heritage, community development and wellbeing sectors. 

“We bring inspiring, compelling and diverse stories of real people to an international audience. All of our work is underpinned by our belief that people from all backgrounds have stories that deserve to be heard. 

"We don’t do unemotional, academic history, because for us, history is personal. TURNING POINT addresses the gaining of freedom and agency within the colonial context. The narrative arc crafts history’s neglected voices with fierce beauty, in a call to arms: journeys from British colonial heritage await to be explored.”

Sweet Patootee Arts

Talk with Naval Servicewoman of the Year, Kay Hallsworth

1pm - 1.25pm | Queen's Privy Chamber 

Kay Hallsworth worked for 28 years as a nurse and medical services officer within the Royal Navy and Queen Alexandra's Royal Naval Nursing Service. In 2020, she was named Naval Servicewoman of the Year. 

She has lived with a life limiting chronic illness for most of her adult life. In her talk, she will reflect on her journey and the importance of resilience and compassion in her career. 

Talk: Reflections on a military career with Ally Musthan and Jason (Jay) French 

1.25pm - 1.55pm |  Queen's Privy Chamber

Join Ally Musthan and Jay French who will discuss their military careers and the complexities of transitioning from military to civilian life. They will also discuss the psychological effects of military service, and the discrimination that armed forces personnel face.

Please note that this talk will cover topics including suicide and survivor's guilt.

About Ally Musthan

In 2009, Ally Musthan joined the Honourable Artillery Company. He later joined F Company, 7th Battalion The Rifles, where he participated in countless training exercises in the UK and abroad before deploying on an operational tour in Afghanistan.

In 2018, Musthan won the Inspiration of the Year award by the British Ex-Forces in Business organisation for his exemplary transition from the military into the civilian workforce. In 2021, Musthan started Matglen International Consulting, a security risk management consultancy company. He has also gone on to start a community interest company, the Matglen Veterans Hub which will be the only dedicated space designed to offer support to currently serving personnel, veterans and their families in London, Monday through Friday.

His biggest achievement to date is his role as The City of London’s Divisional Secretary for the Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen and Families Association (SSAFA) where he supports vulnerable service personnel, veterans, and their families with a small team of amazing volunteers. Musthan has represented SSAFA at events at 10 Downing Street and The Guards' Chapel and has been a featured speaker at the SSAFA Christmas Carol Concert.

Musthan’s participation in this remembrance celebration will include sharing his personal experiences in a no-holds-barred, inclusive way. The reality of war has many different facets, and his story will be featured within these Remembrance Day proceedings.

An image for 'About Ally Musthan'

About Jay French

Jay joined the Army as a junior soldier at the age of 16 in February 1987, then joined 2RGJ (Royal Green Jackets), becoming 1RGJ in 1992.

He was promoted to Lance Corporal in 1994 whilst serving in Cyprus on a two year posting with 1RGJ and promoted up the ranks in turn to Warrant Officer Class Two.

Jay served on operational tours to Northern Ireland, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Sierra Leone, Iraq and numerous other countries including Kazakhstan, Estonia and Kenya as an advisor. 

Jay finally left the regular Army in December 2011, going on to serve a further ten years in the Army Reserves with 7 Rifles based in West Ham. His boots were hung up in 2020 for the final time.

An image for 'About Jay French'

Dance performance: The Mirror Has Two Faces

Performance: 1.50pm – 2pm | Great Hall 

Bringing together dance and spoken word, this performance explores the hidden facets of service members' personalities. Until 2000, it was illegal to be gay and serve in the British military; however, the acceptance and support has evolved to become more inclusive.

A Mirror Has Two Faces will take place in the Great Hall to demonstrate how remaining hidden in the closet can damage one's sense of self and identity. It will be performed by Thomas Paynter and Henry Paynter.

In conversation: The Caribbean and the Second World War

2pm –2.45pm | Queen's Privy Chamber

Listen to author Colin Douglas and Dr Kesewa John, lecturer in Black British History at Goldsmiths, University of London, as they discuss Colin's latest book The Caribbean and the Second World War. 

The discussion will provide a longer historical context for the events of the Second World War and its impact on the region. Douglas and Dr John will map the ambivalent relationship between the Caribbean and its colonial rulers in war and peacetime, from labour unrest before and during the war to the persistence of the colour bar in the military. Their conversation will also focus on post-war Caribbean migration to Britain.

About Colin Douglas

Colin’s latest book, The Caribbean and the Second World War (published by Lawrence Wishart in 2024), describes the pivotal role of the Caribbean during the war – and the impact the war had within the region. 

He has written and lectured widely on the subject. His first book, West Indian Women at War (Lawrence Wishart 1991), was co-authored with the late Ben Bousquet and has been widely referenced in literature on the history of the West Indian wartime contribution. In 1988, he produced a widely acclaimed pamphlet entitled Forty Winters On (Lambeth Council, 1988) which was the first major publication on the history of the arrival of the Empire Windrush in 1948.

After graduating from Oxford University in 1985, Colin had a distinguished career in the public services. He was a member of the National Management Board of the NHS. He was also part of the management board for Transport for London and was an executive director of the Health and Safety Executive. 

His parents emigrated to Britain from Jamaica in the 1950s. He is married, with two adult sons, and lives in Catford in south east London.

An image for 'About Colin Douglas'

About Dr Kesewa John

Dr Kesewa John is a Lecturer in Black British History and Convenor of the MA Black British History at Goldsmiths, University of London.

A historian of liberation movements, intellectual history, and gender, Dr John's research and teaching explores transatlantic, multilingual linkages between Afro-Caribbean activists and the evolution and circulation of Black radical thought. Dr John is particularly interested in the intersections of histories of Black feminist and Black radical Caribbean activism. 

An image for 'About Dr Kesewa John'

Talk: Bugle Call – History of the Bugle

2.45 pm– 3.10pm  | Queen's Bedchamber 

Join Bugle Major Jake Pugsley for a performance and talk on the instrument synonymous with the military.

About Sergeant Jake Pugsley

Sergeant Jake Pugsley is an Assault Pioneer Platoon Commander and Bugle Major with a passion for combat infantry engineering and bugling. With operational experience in Kosovo, Afghanistan, and most recently Estonia, Jake has honed his skills in diverse and challenging environments. He has also participated in major NATO exercises in Kenya and Germany.

What’s On

More events at Royal Museums Greenwich.

Banner image: Yeo Tetraptych by Paddy Hartley, artist and former Royal Museums Greenwich Practitioner in Residence. Paddy Hartley is an artist working in ceramic, fabric and assemblage who explores themes of memorialisation and remembrance and the origins of World War I reconstruction.