Welcome to the We'll Eat Well Again Gallery. If you have photographs or mementos, we'd love to see them and even feature them on this page. Do please bring them into One Stop Shop for us to see and you can tell us about your own experiences of wartime Britain at the same time.

In wartime, it was everyone to the pumps. There was no space or time for slackers. The men (and many women) went to the Army, Navy and Air Force and their places had to be taken in the factories by the women and older men where it was often no less dangerous there than it was at the front fighting the enemy.

Photograph Used with the kind permission of Jon Mullis, Lutterworth Observer, (C) 2008

In Wartime, the most ordinary of people do the most extraordinary of things. Acts of bravery and self sacrifice become almost commonplace, but are no less brave for all that. Many suffered terrible injuries - physical and mental - which affected the rest of their lives, and many did not survive to enjoy the benefits that their sacrifices had brought about.

Medals were one way of recognising the efforts and achievements of those who took part in the war - particularly those who were in the armed forces.

Often though, no such recognition was forthcoming and only now are the efforts of those who were on the home front being recognised, e.g. the Bevin Boys (conscripted coal miners), the Land Army girls, Merchant Navy seamen, etc.

Here, Rev. Ernest Brown proudly displays his medals.

By the end of the first year of the Second World War, agriculture in England and Wales had lost almost 50,000 men to the armed forces and other essential occupations.

During the First World War the government established the Women's Land Army. The severe shortage of labour persuaded the government to reform the organization and by 1944 there were 80,000 women volunteers working on the land. The majority already lived in the countryside but around a third came from Britain's industrial cities.

Women in the Land Army wore green jerseys, brown breeches and brown felt slouch hats. They did a variety of jobs and a quarter were involved in milking and general farmwork. Others cut down trees, worked in sawmills and over a thousand women were employed as rat-catchers.

Margaret Towers - shown here - must surely have been the smallest of them all well under five feet tall. Now a sprightly 80 years old, Margaret is still a regular volunteer at Lutterworth Volunteer Centre.

The government introduced National Registration Identity Cards under the National Registration Act 1939. Initially, adult identity cards were brown, the same colour as children's cards, but in 1943 a blue card was introduced for adults.

All civilians, including children, had to carry an identity card at all times to show who they were and where they lived. The identity card gave the owner's name and address and unique National Registration number. The local registration office stamped the card to make it valid.

Identification was necessary in case families became separated in the event of bombing or if the children were evacuated to another part of the country. People also had to produce their identity card along with their ration book when they were claiming their share of food or clothes.

The British wartime identity card scheme was abolished in 1952.

There might not always have been the wherewithal to eat terribly well in wartime - and rationing persisted into the early 1950s - but people certainly knew how to celebrate when it was all over.

Lutterworth, like most towns in Britain, erupted into a period of all kinds of celebration including concerts, dancing, family reunions. Celebrating took many forms. With the soldiers just home from war, these were the baby boomer years! And the flags came out everywhere for street parties for the children.