Newbury Remembers
Newbury's town war memorial was dedicated on 1 October 1922. The bronze panels affixed to the wall surrounding the memorial cross contain the names of 338 men and 1 woman, who lost their lives as a result of their involvement in the Great War.
The stories behind these names are being researched by a small team led by Phil Wood from the Newbury District Field Club (Newbury's local history society).
As and when the stories are available they will be published on this website; this page offers simple access to the stories. For a full list of names and more on the memorial itself see its entry here.
This page also lists here the names for whom no positive identification has yet been made.
Further names from WWII were added on a second tier of bronze panels above the original Great War panels. These names are not included here, but we would welcome any information that could be incorporated in the future.
Virtual Memorial
There is another group of men; those who should have been included - but were not. There does not appear to have been any formal process to determine what names were included, the War Memorial Committee seem to have relied upon submissions by relatives, churches, etc. This led to the addition of some men with little personal connection to Newbury and the omission of men who had no relative who was prepared to push for their inclusion.
There are also at least two instances of WW1 servicemen who committed suicide who do not appear on the memorial. It is possible that these men were deliberately excluded, though it is equally possible that their families did not seek to have them included. Either way modern sensitivities would suggest that these men were two more victims of this dreadful war and deserve to be remembered.
A virtual memorial has been created to gather the names of men who might be added to the town memorial at a later date. This includes all names in contention for addition, some will be confirmed, others will be deselected as more is discovered about them, and more may be added as their names are uncovered. If you have a relative who you think should be on the memorial, please contact us.
Stories
There are 333 stories so far:
Stories from the Virtual Memorial
There are 7 stories so far:Allin GH | Brocks HE | Fisher E | Hazell EJ | ||||
Hollister FL | Shafto AD | Smith WS |
Headaches
These are the names on the war memorial that have not been attributed to any specific individual. In some cases a story has been written to detail the ongoing struggle to identify an individual - in these cases the name is a link to that story.
There are 10 headaches remaining:
Bailey R | Donovan G | Giles E | Holmes F | ||||
King W | Parsons A | Pearce F | Slade CH | ||||
Taylor TL | Westall F |