A COMMUNITY has travelled back in time to mark the 60th anniversary of the end of the Second World War.

The village of Greatham, near Hartlepool, became a 1940s time-warp for 24 hours at the weekend.

Windows were criss-crossed with tape against bomb damage and houses observed a blackout. There was wartime food rationing in the shops, an armed encampment, complete with field hospital, and the road into the village was blocked by a barrier.

Villager Malcolm Thompson, spokesman for a 70-strong army of organisers, said: "During the war, there were six regiments and an airfield here."

Villagers were outnumbered and life was never the same again, he said.

"Troops married village girls and some village girls moved away, never to come back.

"Houses were commandeered, tank traps and pill boxes were built around the village and a barrier placed across the entrance to the village."

Individual houses had their own stories to tell, like the former home of the village policeman whose pilot son survived the war, only to be killed when his parachute failed to open following a post-war air crash.

There was the home of a couple who welcomed troops billeted on them, despite being told all three of their sons had been killed in action.

Their kindness to strangers was rewarded when their sons came safely home from prison camps, liberated by the allies.