The War Memorial

Memorials to those of St Agnes Parish who died in the World Wars

How often have we seen a war memorial but not known who the people were who were named on it? In your own area, you may have looked many times at the memorials without recognising even one family name, never mind the individuals. Some years ago one or two of us in St Agnes started to wonder what might be found about the names on our walls. The most striking memorial is the one to the fifty three men who were killed in the First World War.

Funds were raised from 1919 to commemorate those who perished in that war, correctly dated 1914 to 1919 because peace was not official until the Treaty of Versailles was signed in 1919. The funds covered alterations to the sanctuary, the marble memorial shown above and, much later, the purchase of land to erect the Church Hall. The war memorial plaque was dedicated in December 1920.

Like many church war memorials, the plaque lists not only casualties who lived in the Parish but also regular worshippers who lived further afield and even those who had regularly worshiped in St Agnes while visiting relatives.

Indeed, the first name turns out to be Carol Awdry, the older half-brother of the Rev. Awdry, author of the Thomas the Tank Engine books. The family lived in Hampshire but, probably after the death of his mother, the young Awdry stayed with his uncle and aunt who lived in St Agnes Parish. He may also have stayed later with them if he was unhappy about his father remarrying. He was a second lieutenant in the Royal Munster Fusiliers and was killed, aged 20, just four days after the first meeting of British and German troops in August 1914.

We have now visited some of the Commonwealth War cemeteries on the Western Front in Belgium and France.