days spent back in World War 1

You'll have to forgive me, I've been a little emotional since the beginning of October.

I'm spending most of my waking hours in the early twentieth century working on the biggest project that the BBC will broadcast to mark the centenary of the First World War next year.

It's a special  project across all local radio Stations called World War One at Home.
My job is to search out local stories which will surprise, show the huge impact World War I had on us here at home, and remember those who gave their lives between 1914 and 1918.

It's fascinating work , and I'm coming across interesting, heart warming, desperately sad, and riveting stories which will be broadcast next year. Those stories just won't appear on local radio though, they'll be across the BBC website too, and they will be archived for posterity at the Imperial War Museum.

For someone who's loves history as much as I do, this is a dream project to be working on, to make sure that what happened won't be forgotten by today's generations and those in the future.

Last week, I went to Belgium, to visit the area around Ypres, or Ieper as it's also called.  The name became synonymous with destruction, trench warfare, and the slaughter of half a million soldiers in the battlefields nearby during the four years of the war.

The Flanders Field Museum in Ypres...

Ypres was destroyed by German troops during the war,with a hardly a building left standing. But it was rebuilt, recreating the layout of streets and the buildings.

The sacrifice that so many British and Commonwealth soldiers made there is remembered every night at the Menin Gate Memorial at a very special ceremony which takes place at 8pm sharp. The ceremony, and the names of 58,000 British and Commonwealth soldiers commemorate those who died but whose bodies were never found.

 

 

 

 

Wreathes and crosses are left there every day by visitors, well wishers, and families of the dead

 

 

And as my eyes scanned the rows and rows of names, and where they came from, my heart grew heavier and heavier, my throat grew tight , at one stage I felt as if I couldn't breathe as I realised the scale of the slaughter around here.

 

 

 Of course it's difficult to see each name, but in each pillar, there's a niche

 

 

 

where there are books listing the names of everyone commemorated . 



 

 

 

Traffic is usually streaming under the Menin Gate, but at 7.45pm, it is halted, and the crowds stand ready

 The Last Post is played by men from the town's fire brigade, wreaths are laid, and then everyone moves quietly away at the end of the simple fifteen to twenty minute ceremony, all moved by the

experience. 

 

The traffic begins to flow again under the Menin Gate, and Ypres come back to life once more.

 



 

 

 

 

 

There's no track today, but here's the link to a feature I made about the ceremony and the people I met there..... please listen....

 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p01jwlgc