Timewatch The Last Day of World War One

Thanks to the capper at The Box



Shown as part of the BBC's Ninety Years Of Remembrance series.



The treaty that ended the First World War was signed just after 5am on 11 November, 1918.

But those involved decided that the fighting would stop at 11am to allow news of the Armistice

to spread to all the troops.



In an affecting documentary, Michael Palin looks at the lives claimed during those last remaining

hours when the war was technically over but when, in pockets of conflict throughout France,

the killing sporadically continued.



The last British soldier to die, George Edwin Ellison from Leeds, was killed just 90 minutes before

Armistice was declared. The last US soldier fell at 10.59am.



Palin speaks to historians about these few, final, bloody hours, and touchingly takes Ellison's

granddaughters to visit their grandfather's grave in a war cemetery, where they lay flowers.

They note that it is the first time any family member has visited this immensely sad spot.