A YORK man's 1000-mile pilgrimage across Europe to visit his father's Second World War grave has been turned into a moving film.

Chris Powell, 78, overcame the odds to make the trip by train in June, seeing his father's final resting place for the first time, after he was killed in 1944.

He was helped in his trip by Brunswick Organic Nursery's Social Club - which he goes to in York. Chris has no siblings or children meaning he is the last of his family alive - giving the film its name of "The Only One Left".

York Press:

Chris Powell at the Assisi War Cemetery, where his father is buried

The club's Maja Koch and Adam Myers helped Chris, who has mobility problems, on the journey, and film maker Simona Manni joined them to document the trip in a film that was screened to a packed audience at York City Screen on Wednesday night.

Maja has called the journey "the trip of Chris's lifetime", giving him the chance to finally find out what happened to his father. Chris's mother could never make the journey to Assisi, where her husband Edgar Powell was buried, so Chris's visit was the first time a relative paid their respects in person.

Chris said making the journey meant a lot to him. "I waited for a long time for this. My Dad was killed in 1944, and I was born in 1937, so I only remember him faintly," he added.

"I often think of all the miles I covered to get there."

The film shows Chris seeing his father's grave for the first time, and saying farewell on behalf of his family and explaining that he is "the only one left".

While Chris and his supporters were getting ready for the trip they went through old documents and family photographs in his flat. Behind one photo - of Chris and his mother with Edgar just before he left for the war - they found a touching note from his father Chris had never seen before.

It read: "To my darling Pat and Christopher. Cheer up and don't worry. Just you wait for my happy return. Your devoted husband, Edgar."

They left a copy of the photo and Edgar's moving note to his wife and child at his grave, and learnt from the cemetery's gardener that Edgar, a trooper in the King's Dragoon Guards, likely died in a British military hospital in the protected city of Assisi.

York Press:

Chris Powell with his mother and father, Edgar, who died near Assisi in 1944, while he was fighting in the Second World War.

Maja said they had to overcome several barriers before allow Chris could make the trip - from his mobility problems, to his fear of flying and problems with official documents. Chris didn't have passport before they started planning the trip and no one knew whether he had ever had one, she said.

Speaking to people on the journey to and from Assisi, Maja said the heard dozens of stories of how families were still feeling the affects of the war.

York Press:

From left: film-maker Simona Manni, Chris Powell, Maja Koch, and Adam Myers.

"One woman told us her brother was the child of an American soldier, but they still do not know whether the soldier survived the war or what happened to him, and someone in France told us her family was still split by the fact half had been in the Resistance and half had not."

Chris and Maya have thanked the Brunswick Social Club, the City Screen and other people who helped them organised the trip.