After years of friendly rivalry, the two established journals, Sheerness Times and Sheerness Guardian, had amalgamated.

The direct cause for the closing down of the Guardian was not chronicled, although wartime conditions had greatly increased the difficulties of newspaper production across the country.

The bald statement read: "The Guardian is now unable to continue publication."

However, it was hoped that the absorption of the Guardian with the Times would find favour with readers of both journals; also that the merger would "redound to the mutual interest of readers, advertisers, agents and the proprietors".

The Times could not resist a side-swipe at the Guardian's demise; suffice to say it had "absorbed" its erstwhile contemporary.

It reported: "One very much regrets the passing of a contemporary in whatever district they may have been published or whatever may have been their creed."

Also it had "never sacrificed news to gain advertising, printing 10 and sometimes 12 pages in order that readers received full value and promised to supply Sheppey residents with a journal covering every sphere of local activity".

But the Times itself had experienced a lean period and for a short period during the First World War, and publication had been suspended because so many staff members had joined the Colours.

Nevertheless, it recovered and gained strength, while the Guardian, "owing to various circumstances, had led a more or less chequered career".

Because of wartime reporting restrictions, many stories went unpublished in the newly-amalgamated paper.

One terrible story of the time was about two men who lost their lives while trying to deal with an unexploded bomb.

Just minutes after this snapshot was taken on October 9, 1940, these two men were dead. The bomb they were attempting to make safe at Eastchurch airfield exploded and scattered their bodies over a wide area.

The man on the left was Flight Sergeant Ernest 'Curly' Bishop, 39, leader of the disposal team, who with Sapper Sergeant Frank Soper was called to deal with the 100kg bomb which had buried itself deep in the marshy ground.

Both had braced themselves for the ordeal by first having a hot drink in the NAAFI then pausing briefly for Flt Sgt Bishop to climb down into the hole to remove the last of the bomb's anti-tamper fuses. But a short time later there was the sound of an explosion.

A joint military funeral for the victims was held at St Clement's Church, Leysdown, on October 12.