Flags evoke bittersweet memories

(From left) Senior Minister of State for Defence and Foreign Affairs Maliki Osman and the family of the late Lt-Col Geoffrey Sherman, son Nicholas Sherman and daughter-in-law Rosemary Sherman, viewing two flags in the Old Tanglin Officer's Mess at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs on Jan 3, 2020. - The Straits Times/ANN

SINGAPORE: For the Sherman family, it was a painful but necessary act of remembrance of father and daughter; for Singapore, it was a reunion with two important artefacts of its wartime heritage.

An informal but touching ceremony held at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday saw a British couple in their 70s – Nicholas Sherman and his wife Rosemary – set their eyes for the first time on two colonial flags since they returned them to Singapore in 2012.