KEIGHLEY soldiers’ involvement in a key First World War battle 100 years ago will be highlighted in a new exhibition.

The Men of Worth Project will launch its exhibition about the Third Ypres/Passchendaele campaign in Keighley library on the evening of Friday, October 13.

Eight banners will hang from pillars downstairs in the library, featuring photographs and information about the battle and local men’s experiences.

Men of Worth Project leading light Andy Wade said: “Passchendaele was from October 12 to November 10, 1917 and our exhibition will be up for a similar amount of time for the centenary of it.

“It has been funded by an Oak Fund grant from Keighley Town Council who have very generously funded us for the whole of this year with a £1,000 grant.”

The grant has also covered the cost of the Battle of the Arras exhibition held early this year, and a dedication ceremony for a new Commonwealth War Graves Commission gravestone for Keighley soldier Ivor Tempest Greenwood.

The Third Battle of Ypres and the later Passchendaele were fought in 1917 and ran from July 31 to November 10.

This was the third time this area had been fought over during first World War, and it would be fought over on two more occasions before the war ended.

The exhibition shows cuttings from Keighley News issues of 1917 about local men serving in the various battles during the summer and autumn.

The cuttings are interspersed with War Diary transcripts and images of the men, the battle conditions, and other material found by Men of Worth volunteers during their research.

Soldiers highlighted include Corporal Stephen Tatham, from Keighley, who was been killed in action.

Corporal Tatham, who had been at the front for more than two years, was formerly employed by Messrs Thorpe, Johnson and Co, Keighley.

He was killed during heavy machine-gun fire that forced his battalion to withdraw, the day they were relieved by another battalion.

Another man, Private Charles Edwin Stubbs, from Damems, was a tailor-maker who enlisted in 1916, leaving wife Clara and 18-month-old daughter Irene.

He served with the West Riding Regiment until until September when he was posted missing, and his body was later found.

Private Stubbs’s battalion had been at Dirty Bucket Camp before heading back to the front for attack at Pheasant Trench, where he was killed by machine-gun fire.