successive streets in a six successive weekends in an anti—government demonstration. now, on bbc news are special programme looking back on a year of commemoration for the armistice and scenery. “— commemoration for the armistice and scenery. —— centenary. last month europe marked the end of a terrible conflict. the first world world war cost millions of lives and ruined millions more. a century on from the armistice, this generation paused to remember tragedy, both global and personal. i just cannot believe what man can do to man. i mean i'm known in the village as poppy lady now. this is the imperial

war museum in london. today, along with its sister sites around uk, it reflects world conflict across the generations. the museum was founded back in 1917 to tell the story of the first world war. last month, the duchess of cambridge was here to see a cascade of poppies marking british and commonwealth lives lost around britain. the centenary of the armistice brought thousands more events in cities, towns and villages and even on our beaches. the film director danny boyle who masterminded the 2012 olympic opening ceremony in london led a initiative to create sand portraits of soldiers lost on the battlefields. sean peel from bbc look east watched one project unfolding at brancaster in northfolk. a crisp autumn afternoon on brancaster

beach, tide out, bright sunshine lighting the scene as families and walkers enjoyed just being together, a perfect sunday to remember those no longer here. with the wet sand providing a canvas, work began to create a portrait of a man who died in the great war, there and gone like the tide, never to return to the shores. they're creating an image of the driver steven hewitt. he was born in norfolk. and died in 1916, aged 37. well luckily, sand is quite flexible so you can always comb it over if it's not working. but we wanted to take care. we worked in pairs to keep checking we were doing it right and i think we are really pleased with the end result. stephen hewitt was a driver in field artillery, looking after the horses used to take the guns into battle. he was fighting the bulgarians in greece but one day, out riding, he was attacked by a pack of wolves and died of his injuries. for amelia, it was an emotional day.

stephen hewitt was her great grandad. she only heard this was happening two days before, a chance glance at a piece in a newspaper so she drove here from newcastle. very emotional, i cried all the way down on the journey today. i always find remembrance sunday emotional because i'm interested in ourfamily history at and today, much more. made sure to stop at 11 o'clock to do a two—minute silence and its been tugging at the heartstrings morning. we will be here until it's dark. the century tides chanting their bitter psalms cannot heal it. not the war to end all wars, death's birthing place. as the light faded a poem was recited, pages of the sea by the poet laureate carol ann duffy. history might as well be water, chastising

the shore for we learn nothing from your endless sacrifice. at the end of the day, near brancaster those that came to remember left before nightfall, leaving the incoming tide to take driver stephen hewitt into its arms. the armistice commemoration have centred on lives lost in combat but asjerry jackson from bbc look north discovered, among the graves of those killed during four years of bloodshed, are others of men who died after the fighting stopped. our first world war dead lie in hundreds of commonwealth war cemeteries on the battlefields of europe, the middle east and africa. but more than 130,000 of them died in the uk. this is sunderland.

as the leaves fell in 1918, many relatives must have thought their loved ones had made it through the worst. private robert is wounded in france in mid october and is taken back to a hospital in the midlands where he dies on the tenth of november. it is almost certain that his wife kate would have received a telegram on armistice day, perhaps as the church bells were ringing and people were in the streets celebrating. 0n the 12th, she writes to his regiment asking for the return of his personal belongings. she says, i should be very grateful if you will oblige me in this matter, it may seem a small thing to ask for but it means a lot to me. andrew neil had been blinded in the war. he died six months after the armistice and should have had a military headstone. for nearly a century he lay in an unmarked grave. the problem was that his death certificate said jacksonian epilepsy but it wasn't attributing that

to war injuries. we knew that he died as a result of the great war. then sometime later, we got his pension disability card and this is it. same cause of death but in small letters, due to active service. the man gave his eyes and his life for his country and now he has something back to recognise that. my mum and my auntiesjust said that my grandad was blinded in the first world war, never knew anything else. to see the stone now, especially when you drive up the road and it gleams. it is just fantastic. sergeant neil's story is one of many researched by the northumbria world war i commemoration project. a seven year community volunteer remembrance endeavour. john from county durham had won the victoria cross in the italian alps in the summer of 1918. he was killed four days before

the fighting ended there in october. news of his death only reached his family on armistice day. you can't help wondering what these people would have become, what they would have gone on to do. collectively, they made a sacrifice which we can scarcely imagine today. and surely that at least, we should remain grateful. this anniversary perhaps more than any other has drawn us into our own family history. 80—year—old andrew from surrey had never visited the battlefields but he wanted to find the graves of three uncles who still lie on the western front. bbc south today went with him. andrew and his son richard are making a special journey. aged 80 and andrew sees this as his last chance to visit the

graves of his three uncles who all died fighting in france. he has never made this trip before. they head to a cemetery in the north of france. we are getting close to the british section. where your uncle harold lies. andrew's father edward would have found these visits too painful to make. edwin had answered the call to fight for king and country as had five of his brothers. 0rdinary country lads from chobham village in surrey. against the odds, all six were still alive for years later. but in the final year of the war that would change. of the war that would change. it is just frightening, i just cannot believe what man can do to man. harold was the first brother to die. he was a lorry driver

for the army service corps, delivering supplies to the front line. one day he drove over an unexploded shell and died instantly. that's very sad, isn't it? aged 28. he was the oldest of the three who died. he lived almost to the end of the war then he and his two brothers died in very quick succession. carrying on theirjourney the next grave is especially poignant. andrew's uncle reginald is buried here. of the brothers he was particularly close to andrew's own father. my father has written a letter to his uncle. you were so cruelly taken from my family by that sniper‘s bullet on your first day of active service. we will remember you. there is one more cemetery to visit, the grave of

herbert. just two months before the war would finally come to an end, herbert was killed aged 19. it was his sacrifice which broke your grandmothers's heart. that was the final straw. in the last year of the war the family had lost three sons in the space of six months. tragic but not unusual. many families had been robbed of their young men, a lost generation who had made the ultimate sacrifice. the stirt brothers were part of what was dubbed the lost generation. small communities were hit hardest, fighting to survive without the young men who had marched off to war and as jackie or brian from reporting scotland discovered, even those who returned based a harsh future. the cameron highlanders

left the north of scotland in their droves. full of youth and hope that theirjob would be done by christmas but many of them did not return and it later emerged that the number of highland service men killed in action, more than doubled the national average. the loss of young men was catastrophic. the work on the croft, crofting and fishing, are both activities that require fit, strong, young men and a lot of them just were not there so working on the croft had to be done quite often the old men and women. the sense of gloom that pervaded the whole community must have been palpable. donald angus shaw was too young to fight at first but he defied his parents and left his family croft near portree as soon as he turned 16.

he died on the western front a year later. one of the total of 600 skye men lost to the island community. it is just a lost generation really because many of them had married young and some young mothers who were widowed very young had to bring up their children on their own which was not easy because there was no cars in those days and they had to walk everywhere. sport suffered too. so many young north shinty players fought and fell together that local clubs struggled to produce teams after 1918. bewleys cup hero donald paterson died with his brother in battle. but his pipes which were recovered with a manuscript, still play the tune he wrote while under fire in france.

his mother obviously was grief stricken, losing two sons out of three, just put his belongings away and no one really looked inside the pipe box but the old cover had traces of blood on it and there was a tune in the box that he had written for the shanty club, way back in the trenches and it had not seen the light of day until about 1980. —— shanty. for some of those who did survive the trenches, a new struggle awaited them at home. after croft land promised to the highland war heroes was not being handed over. some occupied the ground illegally, insisting that after taking on the germans and their machine guns, a court order meant nothing to them. those who survived the horrors of the first world war never forgot the poppies which flowered in the mud of no man's land. today of course, there are a symbol of remembrance.

a team from inside out west visited a gloucestershire village where one woman had recruited an army to create the charfield yarn bomb of knitted flowers. my name is helen date and i started the charfield yarn bomb. it was just a simple post on the charfield village forum, asking if anybody would like to help knit a few poppies to decorate our church. from there it grew each month, more people wanting to help and we expanded to do the church and the bus stop and maybe do the shop, and now we are doing the whole two mile stretch, right the way through charfield. we originally said we would knit 3000 poppies but then somebody said, you do realise that 7777 men in the gloucester

area lost their lives. so we decided to make a lot more. it hits everybody every year but this year being the 100 year end of the great war, being reminded of what was done for us brings back the reality of what happened and the sacrifice they made. i say we are about 100, 120 local ladies. a lot of people that did not know each other so it is just amazing the way the group has bonded. i live on my own and since i have been doing the poppies i have met some really, really nice people. people i had seen in the village but had not talked to.

i did not know very many people at all in the village. i go to the pub and meet the people there but there is fewer women there and i have met some really nice ladies and had some really good conversation and fun times with them. each one is a life that was lost in the great war and each one of these to me, is a person, not only that we lost but somebody made these poppies with love. put that on the church. put that on the church box. put that on the vicar's head! this one? yeah, reverend rupe, put it on his head! hmm. yeah, he'd like that! we need to make sure we have enough to get right the way through the village. i think there is going to be plenty of poppies, we have got 11,000. everything is going out now,

it is like a pinch me moment when it is all happening. i love it, it is great, really good, it is taking a lot of work. yeah, it is really made me think a lot about all the people who went off to war. that is just unbelievable. it could not have worked any better, right to the end. we have done it! thank you all so much. thank you! i am known in the village as the poppy lady now, that is my name, i have not got a name, it's the poppy lady. poppies! as world war i recedes into history, how will we continue

to remember the events that unfolded during those four costly years? well, one ambitious plan is to link existing footpaths along the western front stretching from switzerland to the belgian coast and creating a journey of remembrance, as i discovered that idea originated letters from the front written by a young british officer. their graves scattered up and down, the ground is so pitted and scarred and torn with shells and torn with shells and tangled with wire. alexander gillespie was 26 when he wrote his last letters home, in the weeks before his death he began to plan a project that could now become his legacy. my great—uncle was a prolific letter writer. country file presenter tom heap is alexander's great—nephew. he had this extraordinary leap of imagination when he was actually the trenches amongst the fighting

that he thought when this is all over, when peace comes, we should put a route along no man's land for people of all nations to come and walk along. the vision is a network of marked footpaths stretching from the swiss border to the belgian coast, tracing the trench lines of the western front. that is over 630 miles. that means negotiating with dozens of land owners and local councils and so far, reaction has been encouraging. translation: from the first moment i heard about the path, i immediately saw how it could work. i think we must widen the ways that we remember the past because if we do not do that, people will lose interest. high on the ridge stands this memorial to canadian troops who fought on the western front.

here too, gillespie's vision has received an enthusiastic welcome. i think it is a great opportunity, we have some visitors who come on pilgrimage to visit and follow the path of their ancestors and this gives them an alternate route than taking highways and going around and about, they can actually walk the western front as their ancestors did. tom heap believes that project like this provide new ways of connecting the conflict that is moving further and further into our distant history. this to me is exactly what my great uncle envisioned when he was those trenches 103 years ago today. he died near here, we do not know exactly where to me, it is quite spine tingling the thought that we are pretty much doing what he envisions. i would like to send every man, woman and child in western europe

on pilgrimage along that sacred road so they might think and learn what war means from the silent witnesses on either side. a sentimental idea perhaps but we might make the most beautiful road in all the world. reconciliation was an essential theme of the centenary and ourfinal story mirrors that. julie donovan from inside out yorkshire and lincolnshire brought us yorkshire and lincolnshire brought us the tale of two families from opposite side of the conflict to meet up in the old ghosts to rest. this is a man on a mission, he has come to grimsby from the south of france, searching for the truth about his uncle who died in world wari about his uncle who died in world war i ‘s. traffic mac an father did not top much about his brother —— traffic mac we were very young so he

could not help us much. he died after... william martin him across the airship but refused to rescue the airship but refused to rescue the 16th man crew. ever since skipper martin has been criticised for his decision to let the germans die. 0ryears ago, for his decision to let the germans die. 0r years ago, we film skipper martin is great—grandson patjohnson —— thompson. martin is great—grandson patjohnson -- thompson. ifi could make amends i would. all i can do is offer my sincere apologies to this family. the air man's nephew got in touch after seeing this film and he wants to meet pat. when i found that he had gone to ask if his great—grandfather's name to give —— ask for forgiveness i felt it was my

responsibility to grant forgiveness might bother's half. for pat it was good to be an emotional meeting. we have a pass to put right for our families and i hope we can put it right when you are in england, welcome to england. what -- they asked for help but skipper martin said the group was heavily outnumbered and asked for the trawler to turn away. skipper martin never recovered from the terrible decision he made that day, within a year at the age of 45 he was dead. in grimsby 0'neill year at the age of 45 he was dead. in grimsby o'neill and pat are back together —— emil. they have a final duty to perform at the great.

translation: i am here speaking to you, today on the behalf of my family i'm sure to bring you are forgiveness. —— i am sure to bring new our forgiveness. one of the most powerful exhibits marking the armistice centenary came from the archives that the imperial war medium. during the war artillery observers used sure sound measurements to cut leap the position of german guns, they were marked on charts and one of the charts record moments that was leading up to the ceasefire. sound designers used it to recreate what the soldiers on both front lines would've heard that a. so i will leave you with the sound of the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month, 100 years ago so mac goodbye. #bombs falling

the weather is causing allsorts of problems overnight as storm deirdre is felt. we will seek freezing rain bringing widespread ice but also heavy falls of snow. be met office amber warnings of snow are constricted in scotland where we can see ten to 20 centimetres building in but the ice warnings extend from scotla nd in but the ice warnings extend from scotland across northern ireland into parts of the midlands as well, court hears in place. temptress dealt breezing in a few spots and after that, we have this area of low pressure moving. the air is quite warm across the south although it would not be lit, temperatures will be above breathing this afternoon and across the north we will have more significant problems with freezing rain in scotland and also heavy snow combining to bring some

treacherous conditions out and about on the roads and that continues overnight with blizzards over the high ground, poor usability, —— visibility, poor driving conditions. ten to 20 centimetres expected in some places, but ultimately as we get was the end of the night we will start to get mild, westerly winds blowing in which will lift the cha pters blowing in which will lift the chapters are freezing. further south words, there is the chance of breezing rain across northern england, and i see big hazard. that could be some heavy snow as well in the forecast and then it gets very windy. west and wales, north—west england with gusts of wind expected to reach up to 72 miles an hour. this could bring some tree branches down and localised destruction. two is the end of the night, the west of the weather will be blowing its way through and we will start to see the weather turning a good deal milder with temperatures pushing back into positive territory so travel, over

the course of this afternoon, overnight and into the best part of sunday, strong to treat —— storm deirdre could bring some atrocious conditions in ice and heavy snow. this is about the transition to milder conditions. sunday, a much milder conditions. sunday, a much milder day, cloudy with outbreaks of rain across western part. could bring one or two issues but the temperatures pushing back to the twin six and 10 celsius and a trend to milder weather continues into next week temperatures pushing back up next week temperatures pushing back up to 12 celsius so the transition to milder weather, yes but in the short term we could see some truly atrocious conditions out in the road across the northern half of uk undercount of ice and also heavy snow and as well as that we could even get some power cuts as power lines get weighed down. that is your latest weather. this is bbc news. i'm lukwesa burak.

the headlines at 2: the work and pensions secretary calls for a cross—party consensus to find a way forward on brexit, as the foreign secretary says it's still possible to get a version of the prime minister's deal through parliament. a huge fire breaks out at chester zoo. visitors and animals are evacuated as firefighters battle to get it under control. un climate talks in poland are extended after continuing through the night, as countries try to agree the way forward for the paris agreement. freezing rain, ice and snow hit parts of the uk as storm deirdre arrives on one of the busiest shopping weekends of the year. this is the scene live in paris where protesters have taken to the streets for a fifth weekend of anti—government demonstrations