Ann Middleton is commercial manager at Didcot Railway Centre.

AS I write this, representatives from the main protagonists are in Belgium commemorating the centenary of the third Battle of Ypres, better known as Passchendaele.

In the Great Western Trust Museum at Didcot, we have a number of items with connections to the Great War.

One of the most interesting is a silver teapot made by Bracher & Sydenham of Reading who held a Royal Warrant granted by King Edward VII.

The teapot was presented to Mr David Ireland who retired as chief ticket collector at Didcot Junction Station in 1910 after forty-eight years' service with the Great Western Railway.

In addition to the teapot, the collection by his numerous friends and admirers amounted to £108 12s 0d, the equivalent of nearly £12,000 today.

The presentation was made on May 9 but was of a private nature due to the death of King Edward VII three days earlier.

In addition to the engraved teapot we have other items relating to Mr Ireland including a tinted family portrait and the subscriptions book which is a record of those who donated to his retirement collection.

Mr Ireland must have been very highly regarded as there are some substantial sums of money listed.

You may be wondering what an event that occurred in 1910 has to do with the Great War.

Soon after the outbreak of war in August 1914 thousands of young men flocked to the army recruiting centres in a frenzy of patriotic fervour.

This left much of British industry – including the railways – very short of labour.

In an attempt to solve this problem, many fit, recently-retired men were recalled to the railways' service.

Mr David Ireland at Didcot was one of these men who would have continued to work until the end of the war by which time he would have been around seventy years of age.

It is remarkable how a silver teapot can tell a story of great social upheaval more than a century ago.

Such were the continuing labour shortages that in March 1915 the Railway Executive looked at the employment of women in grades formerly occupied by men, but that is a topic for another story.

We hope our Rails on the Western Front event this weekend will inspire visitors to explore their own families’ stories of the Great War.

And, for the first time, visitors in wheelchairs can book access to a battery-powered stairclimber for the event.

See didcotrailwaycentre.org.uk