A school trip to northern France brought home the horror of war for Old Palace School's year nine pupils.

As part of their history studies girls from the school on Old Palace Road visited the French Memorial at Notre Dame de Loreette which commemorates the deaths of 22,000 young men most of whom died in battle in 1915.

Caroline Gibbs, 14, said: "I did not imagine it to be like this. It is incredibly sad that so many people died."

The pupils also visited a cemetery at Neuville St Vaast, a more austere site where 45,000 German soldiers lie.

Romina Meewella, 13, said: "What I found particularly moving in the German cemetery, was the fact that occasionally you would see a Jewish grave in between two Christian ones."

The final stop on the trip was the Canadian Memorial at Vimy where a white marble monument on the ridge commemorates more than 11,000 Canadian soldiers who were killed in the 1917 Battle of Arras.

Guides took students into the Grange tunnels which were built prior to the offensive in April 1917.

Pupils were shown round preserved trenches where the land is still marked by the effects of explosive shells.

Ellie Higgins, 13, said: "I felt a little claustrophobic in the tunnel, and I was only down there for a few minutes. I can't imagine what it must have felt like being down there as long as they were. Some of them were not much older than us, it must have been so awful for them."