The Fairlie Community Association are preparing to host their Great War exhibition which opens its doors to the public this weekend.

The display is available to view in the Village Hall from Saturday 27 June to Sunday 5 July.

With photographs, campaign maps, military documents and memorabilia, the exhibition tells the stories of the men who left the village to serve in the first World War which lasted from 1914-18.

There will be 18 roller banners telling the stories of 126 men named on the plaque, plus information about village life.

Picture displays include a soldier who was a prisoner of war, while there will be postcards from the Somme.

Rare photographs taken by a soldier who served in the desert, and a poem about Fairlie written by one of the men with accompanying photographs, will feature.

Military documents of the period including attestation papers, demob papers, death telegramsform part of the display, and there will be a map of Fairlie in 1912.

A poignant slideshow will show photographs from Gallipoli and the Somme, with narration from letters sent home by the soldiers describing their experiences. There is a local link to these photographs which originated from from Lt. Gen. Hunter-Weston’s collection, and were provided by Angus Cochran Patrick of Hunterston.

The exhibition will also include campaign maps, replica medals and mementoes loaned by family members and the community.

Laptops will be available for people to view The Fairlie’s Men Of The Great War website, and a special booklet will be on sale.

For youngsters, there’s a quiz sheet to fill in as they go round, and colouring-in sheets and wordsearch sheets.

If visitors would like to find out more about someone who served, they can leave information, and one of the volunteers will search the military documents online, and get back to them with their findings.

As well as studying the Largs News archive, Elaine Campbell of the Fairlie Community Association, and her team of volunteers, spoke to Sarah Goldie at Largs Museum, and accessed historic war records, spending Wednesday afternoons carrying out extensive research in the Village Hall.

In addition, Fairlie Primary School have been researching the war memorial. The overall project, which gained funding from Awards for All, was the brainchild of Fairlie resident John Riddell to educate and inform the public about the history of the village.

And during a presentation about the exhibition to Largs and North Ayrshire Family History Society in February, an audience member Arthur Davis, 82, alerted researcher Elaine Campbell that his father Alfred’s discharge paper was one of those on display. Arthur has helped provide further information for the exhibition.

* Admission is free, and refreshments are available. Opening times are from 11am to 5pm (Saturdays and Sundays), from 2pm to 6pm (Monday, Wednesday and Thursday), and from 2pm to 8pm (Tuesday and Friday).