Sitala Peek
BBC News, London

Thank you for your company today.

We have enjoyed seeing all of your photos and hearing about how you have celebrated the 75th anniversary of VE Day in lockdown.

Image source, Getty Images

Let me leave you with an extract from this soundscape by the Imperial War Museum - called Voices of War, external - recounting the experiences of those who witnessed the event.

Patricia Fitzgerald recalls: "You suddenly thought everything is going to be beautiful tomorrow.

"It took an awfully long time actually but there was definitely a feeling of, a lifting you know, you could start to live again."

Image source, Getty Images

Here is how you can follow the BBC's VE Day coverage this evening:

20:00 BST - Another BBC One special will feature Welsh soprano Katherine Jenkins, actor Adrian Lester and singer Beverley Knight, who will be performing some well-known songs from the 1930s and 40s. The programme will culminate in the nation being invited to sing along to a rendition of wartime classic 'We'll Meet Again'.

21:00 - A pre-recorded speech by the Queen will then be broadcast on BBC One - the same time as her father King George VI gave his radio address 75 years ago.

21:30 - Spotlights will light up the sky in Portsmouth to recall the experience of blackouts during the war. The local council says the lights are also to remind people "that lighter times will come again".

"I remember we were terrified of being recognised, so I pulled my uniform cap well down over my eyes."

Nineteen-year-old Princess Elizabeth and her sister Margaret were allowed to venture out into the crowds to experience VE Day with the people who had gathered outside Buckingham Palace.

Here, the Queen explains in her own words what VE Day was like for her.

An entertainer has been singing Vera Lynn's 'We'll Meet Again' - the song that encapsulated the sadness and determination felt by families separated during World War Two - for neighbours.

Ruby Mann, from Shirley in the West Midlands, specialises in military events and had been due to perform at venues over the weekend.

Neil Heath
BBC News Online

A couple from Leicestershire have created a 1940s style front room with authentic furniture and ornaments within a gazebo on their driveway.

Mick and Lynn Westwood, from Thurmaston, had planned to have a street party with neighbours, but lockdown restrictions meant they could not hold the event.

Image source, Mick Westwood

"I thought 'what could we do instead?' and I started gathering some old 1940s bits," said Mr Westwood.

"Neighbours gave us some furniture and donated clothes, and I already had an old fireplace.

"We've had quite a lot of interest from people walking past, it's been good fun."

Mr Westwood said he also collected old radios and has been playing World War Two songs on one of them.

Image source, Mick Westwood

Image source, Victor Holloway

Today is extra special for Victor Holloway as it’s also his 75th birthday. He was born in a Reading nursing home on 8 May 1945.

His grandfather suggested they gave him a name to commemorate the historic moment, so he was christened Victor.

Victor’s daughter Andrea says the family would normally be doing something special for a milestone birthday but "due to lockdown restrictions, nothing has come to fruition".

However in the spirit of the day, Victor’s neighbours have turned out to sing him 'happy birthday', given him an afternoon tea, balloons, cards, cakes, and a bottle of Prosecco.

The family hope to celebrate together soon.

Dick Denby, 84, lived in Lincoln during the war.

He remembers sheltering under the stairs during air raids and watching RAF and US aircraft flying in and out of Lincolnshire airfields on bombing missions over Germany.

His father worked in the Observer Corps watching out for enemy aircraft from the tower of Lincoln Castle.

On VE Day his family joined the crowds at the Stonebow, near the city’s Guildhall to celebrate the end of the war with singing and dancing.

Image source, Dick Denby

"There was great, great, great rejoicing," he said.

"I had at least two or three aunts whose husbands were away at the war. They were absolutely out of control with excitement, I can remember that.

"Even I as a nine-year-old was allowed to drink beer for the first time. I think I had two glasses of bitter, which is possibly one more than I ought to have had."

A group of high school pupils have created a virtual choir of 30 voices to sing the World War Two hit 'When the Lights Go On Again'.

BBC Radio Norfolk joined forces with Springwood High School in King's Lynn to record the song, which looks forward to the end of wartime blackout conditions and the end of the war.

It was put together by the school's head of music, Peter Strudwick, for the anniversary of VE Day.

Image source, Nicola May

"My grandad Eric Joseph Griffiths was in the RAF during the Second World War," Nicola May says.

"He was a warrant officer and spent some of his time as a rear gunner on a Lancaster Bomber.

"He was in 550 Squadron and his plane, F for Freddie, was quite famous as one of the few "ton up" Lancasters (meaning it flew over 100 missions).

"The motto of the plane was 'Press on Regardless'."

Eric had two sons with wife Lillian, and six grandchildren.

"I'm proud to remember the sacrifice and service he made to the country," Nicola adds.

Kasper's VE Day was made on his daily walk when he spotted Adam Teecey driving around Shifnal in Shropshire.

Mr Teecey was playing war tunes and sounding a siren while letting people take his picture - from a distance of 2m of course.

At exactly 15:00 on 8 May 1945, Sir Winston Churchill announced the end of six years of war in Europe.

The video above shows the moment the prime minister told the nation that after six long years of deadly fighting, Nazi Germany had been defeated.

Ben Philip
BBC Scotland

As Aberdonians stayed at home, Aberdeen Beach made the perfect canvas for this striking drawing sketched out on the sand to mark the 75th anniversary of VE Day.

The artist responsible is Dougie Bogie, a full-time carer for community justice body Sacro.

Created with one of his patients Jack Dunlop, 75, a Royal Air Force veteran who suffers from PTSD, Dougie said it was an "honour" to be asked by Jack to do something in tribute to VE Day.

It took Dougie just two hours to create his artwork in the sand. Over the years he has drawn several pictures on Aberdeen Beach and he said he doesn't mind his hard work being washed away by the tide within a matter of hours.

An RAF flypast and a national two-minute's silence are among the events marking the 75th anniversary.

See all the photographs here.

Image source, Getty Images

Image source, Rhys Jones

"We can't leave the house to celebrate, but my wife Laura has embraced the VE Day spirit whilst cutting the lawn," says Rhys Jones, from Dorset.

Their dogs Doris and the aptly-named Winston are celebrating too.

Ann Chance was seven years old on VE Day. Her family had been living in Balham, London, and their home was destroyed by a V2 bomb during the Blitz.

"We lost everything and had to move in with my grandparents in Morden in Surrey," says Ann.

When VE Day came Ann found it exciting to be having a massive street party.

During the event she was asked whether she would be brave enough to get up and sing for the crowd.

"They gave me a microphone and I sang 'You are my sunshine'," recalls Ann.

"I was given ten shillings worth of savings stamps for my bravery, it was only years later I realised I had sung the wrong words."

Image source, Ann Chance

Alice Evans
BBC News

Hope they made it in time...

A flypast with a difference took place in Norton, Sheffield, this afternoon.

Watching from appropriate distances, residents cheered as Andrew Phipps - dressed as a Spitfire - and Simon Harrison - dressed as a Hurricane - ran along the lane at about 14:00 BST.

The pair came up with the idea after the party they had planned at their local village club had to be cancelled.

A 99-year-old wartime Wren is planning to complete a 5k (3.1 mile) walking challenge to raise money for the NHS today.

Marjorie West joined the Royal Navy women's service after her first husband, a Spitfire pilot, was killed during the war, and was a teleprinter operator at the secret D-Day planning headquarters, Southwick House in Portsmouth.

Mrs West, who decades after the war was given the Legion d'Honneur by France, has been walking between 10 to 13 laps of her garden in Dedham, Essex, since 16 April.

She said she was inspired by Captain Tom Moore, who raised more than £32m for NHS Charities Together, to take up her own challenge.

In Duncan Avenue in Redcar they prepared for a VE Day street party by moving furniture into the road for their socially distanced celebration.

Image source, PA Media

Ralph Harvey, 89, joined the party on his scooter.

Image source, PA Media

They were also joined by a Royal British Legion standard bearer.

Image source, PA Media

And Sheila Gaffney, 68, waved to friends from her garden.

Image source, PA Media

Bill Rennells was a few days shy of being 14 on VE Day.

"My father was a village publican at Bekesbourne near Canterbury and he sent me round the village on the eve to tell people about the fete and sports day the following day," he said.

"I recall being frightened that there would be a lot of drunkenness on VE Day but, as it happens, there was absolutely none."

Do you remember how you received the news of Nazi Germany's surrender? The BBC would love to hear your memories of the day.

Find out how you can get involved here.