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White is the colour of the hundreds of thousands of crosses in war cemeteries.
War supporters pinned white feathers on men who were not in uniform during World War I to shame them.
White poppies were adopted by the “No More War” movement of the 1920s. The white poppy has become a symbol of mourning for civilian deaths in war and war’s environmental devastation, and of the belief in peaceful conflict resolution.
The Shot at Dawn campaign started in Britain in 1990 to highlight the killing of World War I soldiers by their own military. These soldiers were made mad by the carnage of trench warfare and were condemned for their inability to cope with it, considered cowardice or desertion. They had a white target pinned to their chests and were shot by firing squad. In 2006, the British government issued a blanket pardon to the more than 300 soldiers who had been executed this way.
White is a symbol of truce, an agreement between opponents to stop fighting.
