A PROJECT honouring the soldiers from the First World War who came from North Petherton has been set up in the village.

The 41 names on the war memorial plaque in St Mary’s Church will be remembered as different groups in the town have started doing research into the soldiers’ ancestries.

Wendy McLean from North Petherton has been amongst the group of people doing research into the names and she discovered even more men than the 41 on the memorial who fought in the war from North Petherton.

Wendy, who works as a wildlife photographer, said: “I have done a small family tree for every man on the memorial and I found other people who were connected with North Petherton that had died.

“The military records show this one man who was a little bit of a troublemaker. He was confined to the barracks and told off for having dirty buttons in a parade.”

North Petherton Primary School is also getting involved in the project. Head teacher Gary Hobbs said: “As a school it will be part of our curriculum in the autumn term.

“There’s a lot of research going on at the moment so we will be going through the archives with the children with a local emphasis, focusing on North Petherton.”

St Mary’s Church in North Petherton will also be taking part in the project as they will have regular articles in their benefice magazine over the next four years.

The Rev Jane Haslam said: “We would love to hear from people who may know something about these fallen men, as well as life in North Petherton at this time.”

A facebook page called ‘North Petherton First World War project’ has been set up with the names of those from North Petherton who served in the war.

Wendy said: “What we need is people to be interested in the page and then we can start posting up information on each person on there.”