Young and old gather in English village to commemorate VE Day

The quiet Leicestershire village of Desford has come alive with wartime memories as it marks the 80th anniversary of VE Day with a large-scale community event designed to educate the next generation about the past - and the cost of peace.

From codebreaking demonstrations to digging for victory and making do and mending, the village was transformed into a living history lesson. 

The young attendees said the event had made a marked impact on them.

"In World War One and Two it wasn't just the soldiers and armies being affected, it was everyone back home as well," 15-year-old Olivia Moon reflected. 

Another young attendee, Alex James, aged nine, said: "I'm learning that it was really hard because you didn't know what's going to happen. No one's promised that you're going to be alive tomorrow."

Twelve-year-old Isabel Kendrick added: "Activities like this teach it in more words and actions than sitting in a classroom and learning about it."

Desford's deep wartime roots made it a fitting location. During World War Two, it was home to an RAF flight training school where thousands of young men learned to fly Tiger Moths. 

The village also played a key role in the Battle of Britain, with a local factory producing over a thousand Spitfires.

Older residents shared personal memories of wartime hardship. Stuart Firth (88) recalled: "I spent the war sleeping under the stairs purely because my mother wouldn't go in an air raid shelter... I can get quite emotional about it because I lived through it." 

Betty Taylor (89), described the moment the war ended: "They told me that the war had ended and I ran out the house, running down the street shouting, 'The war has ended!'" 

When asked what she hoped children would learn, she said, "I hope that they know that it will hopefully never happen again and that they will never have to go through anything that we did when we were young."

The event was spearheaded by Kate Twitchin, chair of the Desford Heritage Charity. "There's wars raging at the moment," she said. "If we can just keep the message about what we've done and what this wartime generation did - and about peace and the future - we've got to educate our younger people on that."

As young and old stood side by side, Desford offered more than remembrance - it offered lessons in resilience, responsibility, and the hope for peace.