THE remarkable story of the youngest soldier to fight in WWI is being told at a poignant concert this week.

Sidney Lewis went to war at the tender age of 12 and a 30-strong group of Parkstone Grammar School girls are to tell his tale in song at the Lest We Forget concert at the BIC on Thursday (March 19).

His proud son, Colin Lewis, who lives at Canford Cliffs, Poole told the girls his story and was on hand to help with the detail as they began an intensive three-days of composing.

Colin, 81, said: “He told me he had served in WWI and I didn’t believe it, I thought he was too young.”

It was only after his father had died that he found the papers and discovered the truth about his dad who volunteered at the age of 12 in 1915 and joined the East Surrey’s. After training he was sent to France and transferred to the machine-gun corps.

The youngster fought in the battle of the Somme in 1916 at Delville Wood. “They fought for six days,” said Colin. “3,600 went in and 172 came out unscathed. He was one of them.”

It was not until his mother got his birth certificate through to him that he was discharged and sent home. “They insisted on seeing his birth certificate to let him out but not to sign him up,” he said.

His extraordinary survival – of 200,000 underage soldiers, 60,000 lost their lives – did not put him off serving his country. He joined up again when he was 17 and served in Austria in the army of occupation.

Colin’s granddaughter Isabel Garvey, 18, a pupil at Parkstone Grammar was delighted that her grandfather’s story was being told.

The song is one of three special pieces in the concert in which more than 400 pupils from schools in Poole, Bournemouth and Dorset are taking part, commemorating the 1914-18 war in song, dance and drama, along with professional musicians.

Co-ordinated by the county council’s Dorset Music Service and Soundstorm, there is a matinee mainly for schools and an evening performance for which tickets are available from the box office.