Private John Parr...

We took part in the dimming of the lights to mark the start of World War One last night. All lights out at 10 and just a candle for the next hour to be snuffed out at 11pm, the time when war was declared on Germany already fighting in Belgium, which was one of the reasons we got involved in it.

It was only supposed to be one candle but we lit three by the front door. Although we used new tea lights , two of them spookily snuffed themselves out soon after lighting leaving just the one.

Although they (and it was the Germans who said this not us) that it would all be over by Christmas, it lasted for four long gruelling years and ground to a deadly stalemate in Belgium and Northern France. Altogether 888,246 young British men lost their lives, many more were injured and there can't be many involved who weren't psychologically damaged by the experience. I can't imagine how dreadful it must have been and am grateful that I live in a country and a continent where we have all learned to be along with one another reasonably well. Altogether about 37,000,000 people around the world lost their lives.

And what occurred 100 years ago still has it's repercussions today. The inept dismantling of the Ottoman Empire is still being fought out in the Middle East today in Syria and Iraq. The humbling of Germany after WW1 lead to the rise of Hitler and the horrors of WW2. That led to the setting up of the state of Israel, a decision that is being fought about in Gaza as I post this blip. And the UK government of the day doesn't come out of it well, arbitrarily drawing lines across the map of the Middle East creating states containing people so diverse it was inevitable that they would eventually fail. We are watching that happen now of course. And at some point we promised the land of the state of Palestine to the Arabs and the Jews! How was that supposed to work out?

The first soldier to die was Private John Parr a 17 year old soldier who was killed at the Battle of Mons in Belgium. He'd actually joined the army in 1912 at the age of 14 to escape the poverty of his background. He lied about his age but how many average 14 year olds can pass for 19, which was the age at which a soldier could serve abroad in the UK in those days?