The British Cemetery of Buenos Aires held a solemn ceremony at 11am on November 5 to mark the bicentennial of diplomatic relations between the Republic of Argentina and the United Kingdom. The principal act was the planting of an elm sapling descended from the trees introduced by the 19th-century Scottish colony of Santa Catalina, symbolising continuity, remembrance and the enduring ties between both nations.
Programme and speakers
• The ceremony opened with a procession led by bagpiper Brian Gibson, followed by a service in the chapel.
• Bishop Brian Williams delivered the sermon.
• British Ambassador David Cairns addressed the assembly, highlighting the shared history and ongoing friendship between the two countries.
• John Hunter BEM, chairman of the Cemetery, offered remarks and coordinated the commemorative planting.
• Pilar Bosca, director general of Worship of the Bunenos Aires City Government, spoke on the civic and cultural significance of the occasion.
• Douglas Robertson of the Presbyterian Church concluded the ceremony with a blessing.
Historical background
The event recalled the 1825 Treaty of Friendship, Commerce and Navigation and, in particular, Article 12, which guaranteed religious freedom and burial rights for British subjects in the United Provinces of the Río de la Plata. That provision enabled the founding of the Scottish colony of Santa Catalina in 1825, a settlement that once covered some 6,500 hectares from present-day Llavallol to the Riachuelo.
Among the colony’s notable figures was John Tweedie, a Scottish gardener and botanical explorer associated with the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh, whose forestry and landscaping works endure in the Santa Catalina forest at Llavallol.
Elm and institutional participation
The elm planted at the cemetery is a direct descendant of the original Santa Catalina trees and was presented to the Cemetery two weeks earlier by Dr. Alberto De Magistris, Professor of Botany at the Faculty of Agricultural Sciences, Universidad Nacional de Lomas de Zamora. The university is located on land that once formed part of the Santa Catalina estate.
In accordance with the Cemetery’s statutes, the incumbent British Ambassador serves as an honorary associate of the institution. Members of the Cemetery’s Board of Directors and staff formally welcomed Ambassador Cairns and extended their best wishes for his stay in Argentina.
Ceremonial moments and reception
For the planting, Ambassador Cairns and Mr. Hunter used a ceremonial spade painted with Argentine and British flag colours to turn the first shovelfuls of earth. Mr. Hunter then invited representatives of municipal, religious, and community organisations to participate in the planting.
The ceremony concluded with a reception where champagne was served and a toast honoured the bicentenary and wished for another 200 years of constructive relations.
Poppy Day remembrance
By Michael Soltys
The annual Remembrance Day service in honour of war dead was held at St John the Baptist Anglican Cathedral last Sunday with Presbyterian elder Douglas Robertson reminding the congregation that this year marks both the 80th anniversary of the end of World War II and the bicentenary of formal relations between Argentina and Britain.
The Argentine national anthem and opening words from Anglican Bishop Brian Williams were followed by hymns and Bible lessons interspersing each other ahead of the sermon and the British Royal Legion’s ceremony of remembrance. The readings were by Bhavna Sharma (the chargé d’affaires running the British Embassy ahead of the recent arrival of David Cairns), RAF Group Captain Sally Cawdery (the defence attaché at the British Embassy) and St. George’s College headmaster Roberto Prata. Congregation and choir sang ‘Abide with me,’ ‘O valiant hearts’ and ‘This is my song,’ to which the Vox Celeste choir, impeccably led by Ian Gall as always, added some Bach – the ‘Chorale’ and ‘Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring’ with Marnix Doorn on the organ.
Beyond the anniversaries, Robertson’s sermon compared those who gave their lives in wars to Christ’s sacrifice on the cross and deplored that there was increasingly less understanding among the young but he also called for giving peace a chance and spiritual renewal as well as remembrance. He further recalled the horror in the words of a British veteran of the 1982 war about looking into the eyes of somebody against whom he had nothing before killing him.
The Legion ceremony then followed with the exhortation (‘The Legion of the Living salutes the Legion of the Dead’) read by Major Lawrence Ward RE and the Kohima Epitaph (‘For your tomorrow we gave our today’) read by Les Space of the American Legion before the wreaths were placed, preceded by bugling ‘The Last Post’ and followed by ‘The flowers of the forest.’
The Lord’s Prayer, ‘God save the King,’ ‘Amazing Grace’ (played by piper Alan Oliver) and William Blake’s ‘Jerusalem’ sung by Vox Celeste concluded a moving ceremony.
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