How did soldiers join the army in World War One?

[SNARE DRUMS]

CHILD: When World War One started the British Army needed lots more men.

So people like my great-great-grandfather Peter chose to become soldiers.

SOLDIER: That’s right. My friends and I all knew this was an emergency.

We wanted to help.

We all lived in Edinburgh and we were big football fans.

Our team, Heart of Midlothian or Hearts, were at the top of the league in 1914.

But the war was more important.

So some of our players and over 600 fans all joined the army.

We all wanted to make our teams and our cities proud.

The same thing was happening all over Britain.

Friends who worked together or came from the same place decided to join the army as a group.

These groups, called battalions, were full of friends, or pals, so people called them Pals Battalions.

Soon there were Pals Battalions all over the country and in four months a million new men joined the army.

I thought that was fantastic.

All the new soldiers like me had to be trained in Britain.

But soon it was time for me to go with my pals to the Western Front and the war.

I was very sad to say goodbye to my family. I was only nineteen.

I’d never left my city before and I was scared.

But it was an adventure too.

At first we marched through beautiful countryside. But that soon changed.

Life in the trenches was very hard.

It was good to have my pals around when I felt lonely and a long way from home.

But lots of them died in the fighting.

Hundreds of pals from the same village, town or city, were all killed together in battle.

Sometimes in one single day.

It was very hard for everyone left behind at home to hear this terrible news.

I was lucky because I survived. But lots of football fans who joined up with me were killed.

Seven of the Hearts football players died too.

Once the fighting had stopped, beautiful red poppies began to grow on the battlefields.

Some people began to wear a poppy to remind them all of the brave soldiers who had died.

War memorials were built all over Britain so in every town and village we could remember all of our friends who had died.

CHILD: And today we should still remember them too.

You could visit the war memorial where you live and learn about stories of the people in your area who fought bravely for our country in World War One.