Far and wide as the eye can wander,

Heath and bog are everywhere.

Not a bird sings out to cheer us.

Oaks are standing gaunt and bare.

We are the peat bog soldiers,

Marching with our spades to the moor.

The town of Richmond straddles the fast flowing River Swale.

The edge of the sweeping Yorkshire Dales.

The town was named Hindrelag when it was first founded and

has stood here for more than a thousand years.

The skyline is punctured by a commanding tower of

honey-coloured sandsone which cast its' shadow over the surrounding rooftops

This is the keep of Richmond Castle

100 feet tall with walls 11 feet thick.

Local legend has it that King Arthur and his Knights of the Round Table

are sleeping in a cavern beneath the castle's rocky ruins.

Richmond Castle was built to make a statement

and it still makes a statement today.

It dominates the North Yorkshire town and more than 900 years ago it dominated

a huge tract of land called The Honor of Richmond.

Built in the 1070s this is a symbol of Normon control over the

North of England following the Harrying of the North a time

when William the Conqueror brutally put down the last of the English

resistance to Norman rule.

It commands superb views across the surrounding landscape

and is perhaps the best-preserved of all the early Norman castles in England.

Ruins have for a long time been a source of inspiration for writers and artists.

And Richmond is no exception.

With its lofty stone walls in its precipitous position overlooking

the River Swale

It's no surprise that countless artists have been drawn to Richmond Castle.

In the late 18th Century J M W Turner immortalised the drama

and romance of the battlements at sunrise in his

luminous watercolours.

Such is the beauty of the place that it's easy to forget that

this is a military structure at its core.

From the 19th Century the castle was the home to the local militia force

and during the First World War it housed a military prison.

This prison was only small - eight cells in total, but it

contains - it embodies - an incredibly powerful story of the human spirit

and resistance to authority.

It was here in 1916 that 16 men, later to become known as the

Richmond Sixteen were held.

They were conscientious objectors who refused to fight,

bare arms or contribute in any way to the war effort.

This could be for a number of reasons. It could be political

or it could be religious there was no one reason why these men

chose to take a stand against the war.

While they were held in the cells

some of them left the most remarkable record of their lives and their beliefs

in the form of graffiti on the cell walls.

There were drawings including a portrait of one of the prisoners' mother

Religious tracks and songs all preserved. An incredibly

fragile record of this remarkable story.

The Richmond Sixteen were eventually transferred to France

where they were court-martialed and sentenced to death by firing squad.

Although this was later commuted to ten years hard labour.

These men were willing to make the ultimate sacrifice

for their beliefs for their morals.

Their ability to maintain their strength when all the apparatus of the military

along with much of society, was ranged against them.

Is a remarkable human story.

And it's a story on a very human scale. But it's played out

here within the walls of an enormous monumental structure.

Peat Bog Soldiers, sung for us by Jimmy Uldridge and Sid Goldsmith

is the well-known political song about the Nazi camps

smuggled through the bars and out of prisons to become the

anthem it is today

A fine example of a song that kept people going within their cells

it links us back to the stories of the conscientious objectors

locked away in Richmond Castle, and reminds us

of the power and potency of prison song.

♪ Peat Bog Soldiers ♪ Up and down the guards are pacing,

No one, no one can get through.

Flight would mean a sure death facing,

Guns and barbed wire block our view.

We are the peat bog soldiers,

Marching with our spades to the moor.

But for us there is no complaining,

Winter will in time be past.

One day we shall rise rejoicing.

Homeland, dear, you're mine at last.

No more the peat bog soldiers

Will march with our spades

to the moor.