Villagers turned into penniless fugitives when they successfully made it to the Turkish coast from Chelmsford prison within 15 hours.

Committee members of the Colne Engaine War Memorial Project raised more than £4,000 for the project and the Essex Girls and Boys Clubs by undertaking the great escape on Saturday.

Project chairman Spike Townsend along with Darran Lingley, licencee of the Five Bells pub, in Colne Engaine, Alison Jones and Gareth Jones all successfully reached the Helles war memorial on the Gallipoli Peninsula – 1,915 miles away from Chelmsford – without spending any of their own money.

They flew from Gallipoli to Instanbul and drive three-and-a-half hours to Helles in full First World War costume.

When they arrived with one hour and one minute to spare, they laid a wreath to Colne Engaine soldier, Lance Corporal Stanley Butcher, 5th Suffolk Regiment, who died in Gallipoli on August 12, 1915.

They also laid wreaths at the Australian and New Zealand cemetery.

Mr Townsend said: “I was absolutely fantastic. We got to the Helles memorial in 13 hours and 59 minutes and we had travelled 1,915 miles, which is quite a poignant mileage because it is the same year of the campaign. It is the same year Stanley Butcher died."

See this week's Halstead Gazette for the full story.