PUPILS at a Cotswold school have created their own living memorial to past pupils who died in the Great War.

All the school, including teachers and parents were involved in planting a commemorative hedge from native tree and shrub species which will sustain wildlife over the next century and beyond.

A successful application to the Woodland Trust secured a pack of 420 saplings and there was no shortage of volunteers to get them planted. The school selected the "wild harvest" pack which included indigenous species of hazel, blackthorn, crab apple, elder and dog rose. The hedge, as it matures, will provide colour from February, with the blackthorn blossom, right through to autumn as hips and fruit ripens and the leaves change colour.

The saplings were planted to mark out the school's newly extended boundary while also providing a corridor for wildlife to move between existing woods and hedgerows.

Headmaster, Nick Seward, was pleased with the commitment of so many: “The First World War cut a swathe through the youth of its day, and the loss of so many young boys and men from this school left a lasting scar on its psyche. There is something of an echo of Rupert Brooke’s famous poem, The Soldier, in this beautiful memorial, and we hope it is an encouragement towards humility for present pupils, given the very different society and circumstances that they now enjoy.”