THE BATTLE of Waterloo's 200th anniversary will be celebrated in Wilsden with Anglo-French fun in the village park, including wellie and onion throwing competitions.

And organisers are desperately hunting descendants of soldiers from the village who triumphantly fought with the Duke of Wellington against Napoleon Bonaparte's French forces in 1815.

The Waterloo Day is being run by Friends of Wilsden Park on Sunday, June 21, said the group's chairman Jane Callaghan.

"The battle took place on June 18, but news did not get back to England until June 21 so we are not too far out!" Mrs Callaghan said.

"We would love to have as a guest of honour anyone who had a relative at the Battle who also had links with Wilsden.

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"Our research has come up with five names which appeared in the Wilsden Almanacs of 1890/91 which an octogenarian lady recalled from her youth as having been at Waterloo.

"These were: Tom Firth and William Hudson of Ling Bob, Will Smith of Norr and Will Dodson and Tom Dodson of Spring Hill," said keen local historian Mrs Callaghan.

She said a cross check against the Waterloo Medal Roll shows that Tom Dodson did not receive a campaign medal and so was not at the battle, but may well have been a soldier in another part of the world.

"Our Waterloo Day event will be held in Wilsden park from 2pm to 4pm and will be a great afternoon out for dads and grandads on what is also Fathers Day," Mrs Callaghan said.

Visitors will roll a dice on entering the park with even numbers then being English and odd being French.

Thus divided, and with paper bi-corn hats, people can take part in the wellie and onion chucking competition, novelty snail racing, bowls and petanque boules and even tugs-de-guerre between the forces, young and old.

"We will also have a Horrible Histories type trail 'Weird Waterloo' full of interesting and surprising facts and all of these activities are free to enter.

"It should be a really fun afternoon

"If we find a descendent of one of Wilsden's old soldiers we would like them to present the trophy to the winning tug of war team," said Mrs Callaghan, who explained that Friends of Wilsden Park was set up only a year ago to try and improve the way the village centre greenspace was being used.

"We got the group together and the first year has really been about raising the park's profile and Waterloo Day is just one of the ideas we've come up with," she said.