For decades it stood as a village landmark revered by children and adults alike who regarded it very much as part of their community.

Eastern Daily Press: The German First World War heavy mortar outside Honing Post Office. Picture: SUBMITTEDThe German First World War heavy mortar outside Honing Post Office. Picture: SUBMITTED (Image: Archant)

It was certainly one of the most arresting sights to be found in any Norfolk village - a First World War German mortar, created to bombard British troops on the Western Front.

For decades the weapon stood as a village landmark in Honing, near North Walsham, revered by children and adults alike, who regarded it very much as part of their community.

But the 250mm trench mortar - believed to have been gifted to the village after being taken from the Germans as a 'war trophy' - was removed 45 years ago.

However, it has now been returned to the village and was officially unveiled this weekend with a ceremony at its new home outside the village hall.

It follows a year of fundraising to secure its return and restoration, which included recruitement-style posters stating 'your canon needs you', with a picture of the mortar. The £500 raised has been used to sandblast and paint the object and put it on site.

Diana Howes, chairman of Honing Parish Council, said: 'It is the elderly people of village who remember the mortar. It is part of their childhood memories. The stories I heard from the elderly people of the village now in their 70s and 80s who as children played on this cannon which use to stand outside the old post office are wonderful, and it's nice to make them so happy that their cannon is now back in Honing.'

She said one villager, Herbert Smith, churchwarden for more than 50 years, remembers stuffing bangers inside the barrel on bonfire night when he was a boy.

Sheila Dunning, 80, from Dilham, remembers the mortar from when she was a child and used to live in the village,

'I remember playing with it and climbing on it and using it as if it were a horse. We certainly missed it when it went. It is as if it has come home,' she said.

Philip Turner, 71, from Horsford, lived in the village as a child from the age of five until he moved when he married at 27.

'When we used to go to the Post office to put our savings in, we would climb up on it and do all sorts of stuff, putting empty crisp packets in the barrel, that kind of thing. It is really nice to see it come back,' he said.

It is thought the mortar initially arrived in Honing in around 1920, as an allocation by the War Trophies Committee, which oversaw the distribution of enemy equipment captured in the First World War, to councils, villages and other bodies.

It is a rare survivor, because most other such 'trophies' were later melted down to make armaments in the Second World War.

Another theory is that is could have been given by Col Reginald Cubitt, who lived at Honing Hall and was the only one of several brothers to survive the war.

It stood outside Honing Post Office until 1970 when it was given to the Strumpshaw Steam Museum whose founder, Wesley Key, used to live in Honing.

It was Col Cubitt, whose family owned property in the village, who gave the mortar to Strumpshaw.

When the village asked to borrow it back as part of its Great War centenary commemorations last year, Mr Key's daughter Kiki Angelrath, (also known as Margaret Key) who now runs the museum, said they could keep it.

Do you have a story about an unusual item in your village? Email newsdesk@archant.co.uk