Are we still up to the Blitz spirit?

THEY say the past is a foreign country; they do things differently there.

- SUSAN LEE

It's a phrase that's been rattling around my head this week as I knuckle down to write a special supplement to commemorate 80 years since the end of the Second World War.

Truth be told, tapping out the story of the conflict from its beginning to end has been no hardship - I love history - but the commission has meant me doing a lot of research.

Facts need to be right, dates checked, numbers verified.

It turns out my A-level in the subject will only stretch so far and there were gaps in my knowledge. What actually happened at El Alamein? Who was Rommel anyway? I'd never even heard of Operation Market Garden.

And while we've all read about the Blitz, uncovering the bald statistics of civilians killed by Nazi bombs across our cities made sobering reading.