The first All Black to die in World War I was Albert "Doolan" Downing, a rangy forward who sported a Ranfurly Shield tattoo on his left arm.

14: One by one the letters arrived in New Zealand informing Gertrude Browne of the saddest news.

13: Alfred Lloyd Speedy's name was drawn in the conscription ballot on January 13, 1917. He boarded the Tofua in April, served as a rifleman for 18 months, and was gassed in France on November 2, 1918. The Great War ended just nine days later.

Students at an Auckland high school had a first-hand look at life in the trenches this week.

12: Of all the soldiers who served and died in World War I, few could match the gifts of Hugh Montagu Butterworth in their descriptions of the conflict.

100 years on from the beginning of the first World War, the Torpedo Bay Naval Museum in Auckland has chosen a theatrical way of commemorating the fallen. Geoff Allen's 'Sister Anzac' tells the herstory of the hospital ship 'Maheno' and the nurses who served aboard.

Over the next four years we will learn much about World War I and the suffering that went with it.

One hundred gun shots echoed over Wellington yesterday morning marking the 100th anniversary of the start of World War I.

The total number of military and civilian casualties in World War I was more than 37 million. Here are the top 10 deadliest battles of WWI.

10: Harriet Sutton had five sons go to war. Francis and Benjamin never came home. Buried in foreign fields, the grieving mother worried their short lives would be forgotten.

The neglected burial site of Sapper Robert Hislop, mourned a century ago as NZ's first casualty of World War I, is expected to become an official war grave.

New Zealand and Australia have very different takes on the Anzac legend, a prominent historian says.

9: They were the first New Zealanders on the Western Front, arriving in France in the cold spring of 1916.

7: While war raged on the Western Front, hundreds died at home in the Featherston Military Camp.

Even while "the monstrous anger of the guns" was hauling millions to their death, the blame game was already well under way.

6: James Thomson Steven was a tall farmer from Totara Valley at Pleasant Pt in South Canterbury when war broke out.

The gravestone of a young soldier mourned as New Zealand's first casualty of World War I is so weathered that details of his sacrifice have been erased by time.

1.One hundred years ago, a day after Britain declared war on Germany on August 4, its loyal dominion New Zealand announced it too was involved in the conflict.

Fast Facts is a series of digital resources for students and teachers. This episode focuses on New Zealand's involvement in the First World War. Courtesy Auckland Museum

Fast Facts is a series of digital resources for students and teachers. This episode takes a look at what life was like in the trenches for soldiers of the First World War. Courtesy Auckland Museum