I think I’ve repaid the amount of my plane ticket from the US in free museum visits alone. I don’t know who decided that museums in London should be free, but they deserve their own bank holiday. And a parade.
If you only have one day in London, spend it reliving the Great War. America, sorry bud, you need to step up your game. I don’t want to hear any excuses about how you were only in the war for a year. The Imperial War Museum was opened to honor the tragedy of the war in 1917. Walking in you are greeted by a century’s worth of massive artillery pieces. Both sides of these machines are terrifying. Their appearance and magnitude cannot be captured by movies or history books. These weapons are often discussed lightly, painting human lives as numbers in a causality count. To see them, however, paints a different story.
May I remind you that this is the entryway?
That’s how obsessed I am with this place.
There are only two exhibits really worth going to, but trust me when I say that these exhibits will draw you back over and over again to the IWM. The second best exhibit focuses on, what else, the Holocaust. Sorry for all those under fourteen, you’re not allowed inside. Neither is your camera. This exhibit, although incredibly wordy, is deeply disturbing. You enter into a round hall to view interviews of Holocaust survivors. From there, the exhibit flows chronologically – starting with the Nazi policies and speeches concerning the Final Solution. The lower floor get dark. Fast. What disturbed me the most was the handful of concentration camp uniforms the curators collected and displayed. Where this exhibit succeeded was in humanizing the victims, a point that’s often missed elsewhere.
But the greatest exhibit of all time was the Great War. Funny enough, it is rather easy to miss as it’s entrance is small and plain. 
But inside? Inside is the perfect exhibit. Actually perfect. I spent a mere four hours inside and am planning to return. There’s a lot American public school doesn’t teach you about WWI. History usually goes a little something like this, ahem, entangling alliances, dead archduke, Belgium, war, trenches, joyeux noel, war, AMERICA COMES IN AND ENDS THE WAR IN A YEAR. YEAH. AMERICA.
-insert eagles-
Not exactly.
In fact, the minuscule amount that the United States featured in this exhibit (literally a four foot wall and some text here and there. Canada got more screen time guys, Canada) was major reason why this exhibit fascinated me so much. There is so much rich history and agony that the US just doesn’t understand, much less document in their textbooks. There’s a drastic difference between a channel 
away and an ocean away. Not only that, but the exhibit is totally immersive. Each faucet of the war features different sounds and soundtracks. In the segment on the homefront battle, factory sounds are played while deep in the trenches you can hear the digging and hushed whispers of the miners. The The visuals are killer. In the recreation of a trench, shadows of soldiers going over the top flicker on the walls, only to be dispersed by the sound of a shell. I could spend hours in this place, or more hours rather. Imperial War Museum. Check it out.
It’s free.