Day 4- Poperinge, Dunkirk, Home.

An early morning of breakfast and packing the coach saw us swiftly on the way to Poperinge. This is a small town in Flanders that was a place of relaxation for troops given a brief rest from front-line duty. It was also a place where many soldiers were shot at dawn by firing squad. We had a chance to look at the graffiti scrawled on cell walls by these ill-fated men. Tom told us how the executions were run and what caused the men to be shot at dawn: usually, this was simply the inability to deal with the sheer terror of the horrors of war. Like so many of Tom's stories, it was very moving.

It was then a short walk across town to the Talbot House Museum which was known in WW1 as 'Any man's club'. Here it is estimated that over half a million soldiers of all ranks called in to do things as mundane as read a newspaper, write a letter, or sleep in a bed. The map on the wall shows dark smudges where the soldiers had pointed to Poperinge, Ypres, and the front line.

There was one last visit with a battlefields connection and this was to Lijssthenthoek Military Cemetery. Tom showed us the grave of staff nurse Nellie Spindler who was killed by a German shell. Nellie was one of only two female WW1 casualties to be buried in Belgium. One of our party found time for a poignant moment remembering a soldier who died of wounds received at Passchendaele.

And so our thoughts turned away from the horrors of WW1 to the exciting prospect of a visit to a massive French hypermarket where purchases as diverse as teddies, keyboards, games, make up, and a lot of food and drink were made.

A flat North Sea was a bonus and we then began the long coach ride home.

Thus the long-awaited battlefields trip was almost over. It is certain that all of the students and staff that went on this trip gained something from it: new respect, new knowledge, new experience, new friends. The thing that is unknowable is just what the fallen soldiers of World War 1  would have thought about a group of youngsters from Chester visiting their graves almost 100 years after they were laid to rest. They might be surprised that a modern generation has made the effort to come and discover their fate. However, I think it is likely that they would be immensely touched by the respectful way that these young people of Upton-by-Chester acknowledged the sacrifice that the soldiers had made for their country.

On the face of it these two groups of young people had very little in common. Soldiers from the age of empire lived in times where people were expected to know their place in society and to act accordingly, whereas we live in a time where independent thought is encouraged in a society of great technological advances.

However, the young people of both eras shared the same hopes and dreams for the future. In our case, we get to live and dream on, and however tiring the journey home was, we were glad to be able to make it.

'We will remember them'