As clocks chimed 11 across Tower Hamlets hundreds of people observed the two minutes silence in honour of those who lost their lives in wartime.

Veterans who lost comrades during World War Two half a century ago paid tribute to their friends and others remembered family members who never returned from the battle for peace.

This year marks the 70th anniversary of the start of the heavy bombing Blitz campaign which killed 2,221 people in the East End and left 7,472 injured and thousands homeless and traumatised by the relentless bombing.

Civic leaders turned out to join services at seven locations with the council chairman Motin Uz-Zaman at the memorial at Tower Hill.

Bethnal Green and Bow MP Rushanara Ali joined members of the Bethnal Green branch of the Royal British Legion for a service at Bethnal Green Library in Cambridge Heath Road.

Branch chairman Albert Hutton who took part in the Normandy landings in June 1944 said the turnout at the service had been good.

Poplar and Limehouse MP Jim Fitzpatrick laid a wreath at the service at the war memorial in St Leonard’s Street in Poplar.

Children at one East London school paid their own special tribute on November 11 itself when pupils at Malmesbury Primary in Bow dressed in red to help raise money for the Poppy Appeal.