VETERANS of one of the most decisive battles of the Second World War will remember their comrades who never returned tomorrow, July 10.

Those who served at the Battle of Kohima will gather for their annual memorial service and wreath-laying in Dean’s Gardens, by York Minster, at 11am.

The 1944 battle of Kohima in north-east India was fought from April 4 to June 22. Nearly 4,000 British and Indian soldiers lost their lives when Allied forces halted the advance of the Japanese army in Asia.

Despite being hampered by monsoon rain and treacherous terrain, the Allied soldiers succeeded in taking Kohima in hand-to-hand fighting that culminated on the loc al District Commissioner’s tennis court.

The battle ultimately proved to be the turning point of the Burma campaign and was decribed by the late Earl Mountbatten as “probably one of the greatest battles in history.”

Those that fell will be remembered by a minute's silence and a bugler from the Band of the Royal Corps of Signals will sound the Last Post and Reveille.