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Seven days ago millions were shocked to discover the United Kingdom had voted to leave the EU. Huge numbers of young voters, who were proven to have been more likely to want to stay in the EU, complained that the older generations, adjudged more inclined to vote "Leave", should never have been allowed to vote. After all, they say, the future of the country belongs to the young. The old won't be here much longer.

The old might well say with some confidence, the young know so little. So few of them have even climbed a tree let alone climbed over the top of a trench into withering machine gun fire . In today's social media world where a severe look at themselves in the mirror means taking a selfie, todays young disrespect those who fought to give them the liberties, democracy and independence they now enjoy.

At 7.30am this morning, exactly 100 years ago, one hundred and twenty thousand British and Commonwealth soldiers climbed up out of their mud filled trenches and advanced towards the German machine guns. By the end of that one day, Friday 1st July 1916, over fifty seven and a half thousand of those British and Commonwealth men lay dead or wounded. How they ever had the guts to go on for Day Two is the sort of thing our pampered 21st century generations will never comprehend. Indeed, they fought on for another 140 days, fighting in that little corner of France. At the end over a million men were killed or wounded. They had gained a strip of land just 20 miles long and 6 miles deep. And this was just one battle whilst others went on at Verdun and other areas of active conflict around the world.

I grew up with grandparents who lived through that time. They had lost brothers, cousins, friends to German bullets and shells on the battlefields of France, fighting to free another nation. Many of the women of that time never married. there weren't enough young men left alive to go round. Such was the need for fighting units to oppose the Germans that many of the battalions were made up of 'pals'.

What were the pals battalions?

At the outset of World War I, Secretary of State for War Horatio Kitchener believed the key to victory lay in an overwhelming force of well-trained, highly motivated soldiers.

General Sir Henry Rawlinson believed that men would be more inclined to volunteer if they knew they’d be fighting alongside their friends, neighbours and workmates.

Who was in the pals battalions?

The battalions consisted of men who joined up together from the same towns, villages, workplaces even football teams

Notable pals battalions include:

•10th (Service) Battalion, Royal Fusiliers - the first pals battalion, formed of stockbrokers from London

•11th (Service) Battalion, East Lancashire Regiment - The Accrington Pals

•10th Battalion, The Lincolnshire Regiment - The Grimsby Chums

•17th (Service) Battalion, Middlesex Regiment - formed of professional footballers

How did they fare?

The pals battalions were a tremendously successful recruitment effort for the War Office, with 142 front-line battalions raised, along with 68 reserves.

However, when pals battalions took heavy losses, as they did in the Battle of the Somme, the effect on their home communities was devastating. For example, in the space of half an hour on July 1, the 700-strong Accrington Pals battalion suffered 585 casualties (235 killed and 350 wounded).

A small dominion, Newfoundland – now part of Canada – suffered 90 per cent losses to their 2,000 strong force on the opening day of the battle.

This was equivalent to one in ten people from the entire dominion - or one in five men.

Seven days ago millions of Britons voted to leave the EU to restore the freedoms and democracy won at such a high price by hundreds of thousands of ordinary British men who never got to know what a selfie was. The young need to learn their history. Don't take what they have for granted. They've never had to fight for freedom, democracy, independence. They don't know the true value of it. Respect your elders. Respect their wisdom.

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