23 June 1916

Indira Varma, Lee Ross, and James Lailey star in this story by Nick Warburton. And Dean Logan plays Home Front's Kenny Stokoe, now serving with the signallers of the Tyneside Scottish.

On a morale-boosting tour of troops massing in the Somme valley, a celebrity poet and priest arrives to perform his popular verse. But are inspirational speeches what the Kenny and his pals really need, when they are days away from facing action?

Meticulously based on unit war diaries and eye-witness accounts, each episode of TOMMIES traces one real day at war, exactly 100 years ago.

And through it all, we'll follow the fortunes of Mickey Bliss and his fellow signallers, from the Lahore Division of the British Indian Army. They are the cogs in an immense machine, one which connects situations across the whole theatre of the war, over four long years.

The drama includes an extract from "First Time In", by Ivor Gurney.

Series created by Jonathan Ruffle
Producers: David Hunter, Jonquil Panting, Jonathan Ruffle
Director: Jonquil Panting.