Fewer people plan to participate in Remembrance Day ceremonies or wear poppies this year, according to a poll from Historica Canada that also suggests knowledge of Canadian military history is dwindling.
The poll found that roughly 71 per cent of respondents will wear a poppy, down from 85 per cent last year; and 28 per cent of people will attend ceremonies either online or in person, down from 41 per cent last year.
Anthony Wilson-Smith of Historica Canada says those findings are understandable, given global pandemic, but the bigger issue, not attributable to COVID-19, is the declining knowledge of military history.
The poll conducted by Ipsos found that four in ten Canadians feel they know more about American military history than that of Canada -- climbing from one-third of Canadians last year.
Meanwhile 16 per cent of Canadians never learned about Canada's key conflicts in school -- including the First World War, Second World War, Korean War and October Crisis.
It also found that 45 per cent of respondents think they know about the history of Black, Indigenous, and racialized groups in Canadian military service, but only 14 per cent could correctly identify the country's only all-Black battalion - the No. 2 Construction Battalion.
With files from the Canadian Press