When 40 school students visit the battlefields of Flanders and The Somme next month, they will each go with a photograph of a soldier who fought in the Great War.

At the end of their visit, the pupils from Aireville School in Skipton will open sealed envelopes and discover the fates of those soldiers who fought in the First World War from 1914 to 1918.

The annual visit to the battlefields by the school will be the culmination of a series of events aimed at bringing history alive.

Last week, the school marked the day 100 years ago on April 26, 1911, when Bradford City FC won the FA Cup.

Team captain Jimmy Speirs, who scored the winning goal in the final, was to be killed just three years later in the war.

Another Bradford player, Donald Bell, the first professional footballer to enlist, was also to die and was the only footballer to be awarded the Victoria Cross.

A replica of the 1911 trophy – the Gunthorpe Cup, made by Fattorini’s of Bradford – was brought to the school by Lt Col David O’Kelly and Captain Jon Dennis, of the Yorkshire Regiment, custodians of the cup.

To mark Bradford City’s FA Cup triumph, the school organised a football tournament with primary school children dressed in replica kit of 100 years ago.

An exhibition of guns, uniforms, cutlery and photographs from the Great War were also on display.

Nick Cusack, senior executive of the Professional Footballers Association, presented 48 students and members of staff with replica 1914 football shirts to be worn during the trip to the battlefields.

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