by Chris Lloyd | Centenary, In Your Town, People
A FIRST World War hero who was awarded the highest military medal for bravery 100 years ago was honoured in his home village today. A memorial paving stone commemorating Victoria Cross holder, Second Lieutenant John Scott Youll, was unveiled during a moving ceremony...
by Chris Lloyd | Centenary, In Your Town, Latest, Richmond
A REGIMENTAL museum is using the centenary anniversary of the end of the First World War as the inspiration for a new project. The Green Howards Museum in Richmond is launching a “Ribbon of Remembrance” project with the aim of creating a lasting link...
by Chris Lloyd | Centenary, Crook, In Your Town, Latest, People
THERE is a mountain named after him in Canada and a market square in France – but until recently little was known of First World War hero George Burdon McKean VC in his birth town of Willington. Nine years ago, Allan Newman, of Darlington, helped change this by...
by Chris Lloyd | Centenary, In Your Town, Latest, Ripon
AN outstanding First World War soldier is to be remembered at a special service at Ripon Cathedral on Thursday. The service will honour Lt-Col Neville Bowes Elliott-Cooper, exactly 100 years after his actions won him the Victoria Cross (VC). He had already received...
by Chris Lloyd | Centenary, In Your Town, Latest, Richmond
HISTORY homework has sparked a story of love and war after a schoolgirl traced her family tree to a heroic soldier. Richmond School and Sixth Form College student Grace Morris, 13, was challenged to find a First World War story in her family and her research revealed...
by Chris Lloyd | Centenary, Ferryhill, In Your Town, Latest, Spennymoor
THERE were gasps of amazement and a round of applause as the curtain dropped on a breath-taking display of almost 20,000 knitted poppies on Saturday. More than 100 people gathered in West Cornforth, near Ferryhill, to witness the grand unveiling of 19,240 handmade...
by Chris Lloyd | Barnard Castle, Centenary, In Your Town, Latest
A STORY of one man’s war will be brought to life to mark the centenary of the Battle of Passchendaele. Highlights Rural Touring Scheme and Blaize Theatre Company will present Standing in Line at the Upper Teesdale Agricultural Support Services (UTASS) centre in...
by Chris Lloyd | Bishop Auckland, Centenary, In Your Town, Latest
A STRIKING display of almost 20,000 hand-crafted poppies will be unveiled in West Cornforth in honour of boys and men who paid the ultimate sacrifice during the First World War. The project to create a commemorative installation of 19,240 has been just months in the...
by Chris Lloyd | Centenary, Durham, In Your Town, Latest
ONE hundred years ago, the telegram boys in the North-East were beginning one of their busiest periods of the First World War, delivering dreadful news to the families of young men out fighting in Flanders fields. The slaughter that was the Battle of Passchendaele...
by Chris Lloyd | Centenary, In Your Town, Latest, Stockton
A RARE First World War wireless station is among five historically significant places listed today to mark 70 years of protecting England’s significant buildings. The wireless station in Stockton, built in 1912-13, is now a grade II-listed building to mark the system...
by Chris Lloyd | Centenary, In Your Town, Latest, Tyne & Wear
THE deaths of seven North-East sailors 100 years ago today in one of the most heinous crimes of the First World War will be marked during a poignant ceremony. The SS Belgian Prince was travelling from Liverpool to Newport News in America when it was torpedoed by a...
by Chris Lloyd | Centenary, Consett, In Your Town, Latest
A WAR memorial dedicated to a soldier tragically killed as he waited to be transferred back to England carrying his comrades’ letters from the front has been given protected status. To mark the centenary of the Battle of Passchendaele, the memorial cross at Hamsterley...
by Chris Lloyd | Centenary, In Your Town, Latest, Stanley
THE homecoming of a miner who won a Victoria Cross while serving as a Western Front stretcher bearer is set to be re-enacted in a pit town. Private Michael Heaviside had stunned onlookers with his valour, crawling 60 yards across No Man’s Land under heavy fire to...
by Chris Lloyd | Centenary, Latest
This summer will mark the centenary of one of World War One’s most infamous battles – Passchendaele. Ahead of the anniversary, David Young journeys to Belgium to explore a still scarred landscape where 100 years ago his grandfather was wounded in action....
by Chris Lloyd | Centenary, In Your Town, Latest, Stokesley
A VILLAGE intent on marking the exact time of death of each of its villagers killed fighting during the First World War has just held its 27th memorial service. Great Ayton has been marking the day each one of its First World War soldiers died between 1914 and 1918...
by Chris Lloyd | Centenary, Chester-le-Street, In Your Town, Latest
THE centenary of a North-East miner’s gallantry on a First World War battlefield was marked with the unveiling of a commemorative stone heralding the act of valour. Descendants of Private Michael Heaviside were joined by civic figures, representatives of the armed and...
by Chris Lloyd | Bishop Auckland, Centenary, In Your Town, Latest
A £50,000 project is being launched to explore the story of the only two brothers to be awarded the Victoria Cross in the First World War and the village in which they live. Groundwork North-East and Cumbria and Durham County Council will use the funding to get the...
by Chris Lloyd | Bishop Auckland, Centenary, In Your Town, Latest
A VICTORIA CROSS winner is to be permanently commemorated as part of a day of events in the County Durham village of Witton Park, where he was born. The youngest general in British Army history, Roland Boys Bradford and his Navy officer brother George were the only...
by Chris Lloyd | Centenary, In Your Town, Latest, Newton Aycliffe
THE Remembrance Sunday special edition of The Northern Echo provided an enormous shock for Arnold Stewart. It contained an article about a collection of postcards that a County Durham miner turned soldier sent from the Western Front back to his new wife in Chilton...
by Chris Lloyd | Centenary, In Your Town, Latest, People, Stanley
WHAT time are you reading this? At 9.10am this very day 100 years ago, hundreds of Durham men slithered up out of their rain-lashed trenches on the Somme and tried to wade through waist-deep sticky mud to attack a heavily fortified mound. “The officers’ whistles...
