Features / Westbury-on-Trym
Bristol’s War: Westbury’s pagan war memorial
The Westbury-on-Trym war memorial was unveiled at 3pm on Sunday, July 11, 1920 at a ceremony attended by the Lord Mayor of Bristol and the Bishop of Bristol.
The unveiling ceremony was notable, however, for the absence of the Rev H J Wilkins, vicar of Westbury-on-Trym.
As in so many other parishes, a committee had been formed after the war to raise money for a memorial. The Bristol architectural firm James and Steadman was commissioned to design it.
They proposed it take the form of an obelisk, but the Rev Dr Wilkins objected, saying this was a “pagan” symbol.
An extremely bitter row went on for several months in meetings and the correspondence pages of the local press, though the committee members and the great majority of the public were ranged against the vicar. It was pointed out that the argument, entirely of the vicar’s making, was a painful and unworthy disservice to the memory of those of his parishioners who had lost their lives.
The obelisk was built, and when unveiled, it featured the names of about 150 men who had died in the war.
Names of local dead from World War II were added later, as was the large inscription which features on a lot of war memorials. It comes from the British 2nd Infantry Division memorial at Kohima in India which commemorates the battle of Kohima-Imphal in 1944, when the Indian/British Fourteenth Army led by Bristol-born Maj Gen William Slim inflicted the first major defeat on the Japanese on land during World War II.
It reads: “When you go home, tell them of us and say for your tomorrow we gave our today.”
This is one of over 100 tales of Bristol in the First World War written by Eugene Byrne for Bristol 2014 and available on a free smartphone app, Great War Stories. Details and downloads at http://www.bristol2014.com/great-war-stories-map-and-app.html
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