IN the summer of 1916, a small village in northern France became a second home to a troop of Bradford soldiers.

Bus-les-Artois, which they called 'Bus', was a haven away from the trenches and the carnage to come on the Somme. It was here on June 30, 1916, that the Bradford Pals prepared for a march to the front line for the following morning's attack. It was a hot afternoon, the men rested in the shade of an orchard, while Pals bandsmen played music in the sunshine.

Days later, after the disastrous attack at Serre, the few survivors of the Pals returned to Bus-les-Artois as shattered men. But they remembered that last ‘perfect day’ in Bus which remained a happy place for them. They returned to the village on regular battlefield pilgrimages,' for egg and chips in the Corner Café, singing once again the songs they sang with gusto on the march.

A century later, in that very estaminet, a group of visitors raised a toast to the Pals, with bottles of beer gifted by Bradford breweries

The men who fell at the Somme have been remembered this summer, 100 years after the devastating battle. But while Royalty and the world's media gathered at the Thiepval Memorial, a coach party from Bradford headed to Bus-les-Artois, north of the battlefield, to unveil a memorial to the Bradford Pals. The unveiling, on June 30, was attended by over 200 people, including the Mayor of Bus-les-Artois, villagers and French Army veterans.

The memorial plans began in 2012, when 20 Bradford City fans, on a tour of Somme battlefields, visited Bus-les-Artois in Picardie. Here they saw a monument to the Leeds Pals, erected in 2006 for the 90th anniversary of the Somme. The group decided there and then that the Bradford Pals also deserved recognition at Bus-les Artois - where the men were billeted and lived alongside villagers, before they fought and fell together on July 1, 1916 at Serre.

A fundraising campaign, supported largely by Bradford businesses, raised £3,000 to cover the Portland memorial stone, carving and transportation, and a surplus of over £1,300 was given to the Bradford Burns Unit , another cause close to City supporters.

"We have been supported magnificently by the villagers and Mayor in Bus-les-Artois and by businesses local to Bradford in this venture," said David Royston, co-treasurer of Bus to Bradford. "Without them, it might not have been possible to deliver, so a huge thank you goes out to Provident Financial plc, Hallmark Cards plc, Peckover Transport Services Ltd, Timothy Taylor & Co. Limited, The Salamander Brewing Company and Wright & Sons Ltd."

Added Bus to Bradford Life President David Whithorn: "The Bradford Pals have been a passion of mine for almost 40 years now. I helped Leeds 10 years ago with their memorial at Bus and now to have its twin for Bradford by its side in the place the men spent their final days has made everything complete."

In June, around 30 volunteers who had worked tirelessly to make the memorial a reality returned to Bus-les-Artois. The Bradford Pals memorial unveiling was attended by PWO Yorkshire Regiment servicemen and the Great War Society ‘Tommies’ who marched in, singing Here We Are Again, a favourite of the troops in 1916. There were speeches in English and French, and perhaps the most poignant of the wreaths laid were placed by children of Bus-les-Artois who were learning how much their small village meant to two cities across the Channel.

That night, some of the Bus to Bradford group stayed on farmland which once included British and German front lines and No Man’s Land. Some took shelter in a barn. "The farmer’s wife advised there were likely to be rats, but hanging up clothing and equipment on protruding nails and putting down a bit of straw, lit by candle, had been routine for the Bradford Pals living in France - what did we care about a few rats!" said David Whithorn.

He added: "Night fell, some slept, others didn't. We thought of the hundreds of Bradford Pals exactly a century ago making their way to assembly positions through the night, a short distance away. They had little idea of their dreadful fate. None would have imagined that 100 years on there would be other Bradford people here, waiting for morning.

"In the front line camp, dawn was greeted by the sound of the farm cockerel. On the nearby road, the first coaches were passing through. The Royal Marines of the ‘Somme Yomp Challenge’ were up; they had walked 650 miles to get there, aiming to plant 19,240 poppy crosses for each of the fallen on that day."

That morning, July 1, the group followed the Pals' four-mile march from Bus-les-Artois to Colincamps. "Rain had churned up the ground, dampening spirits, but the gathering crowd's cheers as we marched off changed all that," said David. "The pace was rapid, everyone thankful they weren't wearing heavy uniforms and carrying the 80lb of equipment that each Bradford Pal had."

The group gathered on the front line, at Monk Trench, facing Serre. "At 7.20am the message went along our line that 100 years before, at this moment, half the Leeds Pals went over the parapet, to machine-gun fire from Germans who weren't supposed to have survived," said David.

"At this point, the remainder of the Leeds Pals and the 1st Bradford Pals realised that in just 10 minutes it would be their turn to face the same murderous fire. Our thoughts turned inwards.

"The minutes were counted down. At 30 seconds, the call: ‘Look to your scaling ladders’ went out, followed by ‘Good luck everybody - see you back in Bradford!’ At 7.30am an original Bradford Pals whistle blew three short blasts, a sound that chilled everyone to the bone. We simply stood, silently gazing to where our Bradford Pals were mercilessly cut down in the field before us.

"No-one there would forget those few minutes and the sound of that whistle."

Returning to Serre Road No.1 cemetery to pay their respects, the group met the Guyon family, descendants of Major Guyon, Commanding Officer of the 1st Bradford Pals. "They too had returned to remember their grandfather, killed near this spot," said David. "We raised a toast to the Pals, then went our separate ways."

The group visited other significant sites, including Thilloy Road cemetery, Beaulencourt, linked to the Bradford Bulls Foundation’s project Birch Lane

Heroes, tracing former players’ involvement in the war. Here they visited the grave of Lieutenant Fred Longthorpe of the Tank Regiment, a former Bradford Northern player who died at the Casualty Clearing Station on September 20, 1918. A wreath of poppies, made by pupils at Bowling Park Primary School, on the club’s former ground at Birch Lane, was laid at his grave.

The group also visited the village of Hebuterne, where a plaque dedicated to the Bradford Pals hangs on a wall by the church, Owl Trench Cemetery near Gommecourt - where nearly all those buried are Bradford Pals, victims of a failed attack on Rossignol Wood in February, 1917 - and Euston Road Cemetery. Among the Pals buried there is Private Arthur Normington whose wife, on hearing the news of his death, threw herself into the Bradford Canal, along with their baby daughter.

At the site of ‘Sap A’, the Forward Brigade HQ, at Serre, the group witnessed the distance the Pals had to cross under machine-gun and shell fire, then with heavy hearts they made their way to Pals' graves at Serre Road No.1. Among the names on the graves is Corporal Donald Packett whose elder brother, killed a few miles south of Serre, is also buried there. Their father left on Donald's gravestone a message expressing his pride in the Bradford Pals, bearing the words: ‘The best he could…for the best he knew’.

The group had taken a jar of Bradford soil to scatter on the grave of a Pal, to ensure they would always have something of Bradford there. The earth left at Donald Packett's grave was taken from the foot of a tree he would have known as a sapling - from his own garden at Southfield Square, Manningham.