A museum in Blackburn will deliver artefact packs to local schools during remembrance celebrations this week to assist in learning and to keep military history alive.

Volunteers at The Veterans Living History Museum work with Veterans that suffer from a wide range of issues, from mental health including PTSD to financial issues.

For Remembrance Day 2023, volunteers will give talks across schools in Blackburn with Darwen to talk to the children about their military experiences and the artefacts, including a first-hand account from the beaches of Normandy.

Volunteer and ex-Air Force Duncan Bolderson said: "We are a small mobile museum based in Blackburn, but we are also a group of ex service men who volunteer and give up our free time.

"We go out to shows, schools and to clubs like Women's Institute to talk about a heap of artefacts that we have from World War 1 to the present day.

"What we have done this year is we have gone into a number of schools and left artefacts for them to study for a couple of weeks as in this period of time Year 6's usually study World War 2 in half term."

They will also talk about their experience in the military in the schools, and describe the museum's history with Lewis Banham.

Lewis was a royal signals dispatch rider who landed on Gold Beach Normandy during the D Day landings, and last year celebrated his 100th birthday at his care home in Bacup.

He was given a grid reference to report to, issued with 24 hours of rations a sten gun and 'Old Faithful' his BSA WDM20 motorcycle.

Over the next two years he was at the spear head of the invasion from Normandy to Berlin bravely delivering vital messages to the allies.

In 2022 the Veterans Living History Museum undertook their own mission to recreate Lewis’ epic journey, purchasing their own BSA WDM20 riding it from Blackburn, near Lewis’s home, to Gold Beach Normandy, and then onward to Berlin to meet Lewis at the Brandenburg Gate to issue him with his final dispatch from the military.

The volunteers will be visiting schools such as The Redeemer Church of England Primary and Burnley High School.

The museum is a community interest company and not for profit, which means donations get put back into the work the volunteers do.

It has been running for five years, with four of the volunteers also from the Queen's Lancashire regiment.

Duncan continued: "We let the kids touch and feel the artefacts and wear the stuff to see what it was like right back in the First World War."