£10,000 grant to help salute 'Pals’ heroes

1:53pm Thursday 20th March 2008

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THE Chorley Pals Memorial has been awarded a grant of £10,000 from the National Lottery.

An appeal set up by MP Lindsay Hoyle, and Brindle historian Steve Williams, aims to raise £55,000 for a suitable memorial to the 215 men from the town who joined up as Pals' in the First World War.

They became Y Company of the 11th (Service) Battalion (Accrington) East Lancashire Regiment - the famous Accrington Pals'.

On July 1, 1916, the battalion attacked the village of Serre in northern France, at the start of the Battle of the Somme.

Like many others on that day, the Chorley Pals suffered a high number of casualties, with 31 killed and another three later dying from their wounds.

Many have no known grave and are commemorated on the Thiepval Memorial to the Missing of the Somme, close to the battlefield.

A further 59 were wounded that morning, making a total casualty list of 93 out of approximately 175 from the Company who went over the top.

In the now filled-in trenches, from where the Chorley Pals attacked, is the only memorial to the men - a small brass plaque on a concrete plinth paid for by private donations a decade ago.

There isn't one at all in the town, although Astley Hall museum has the roll of honour of the original Pals who joined up in September 1914.

The appeal is to raise funds for a memorial - a seven foot statue of a soldier in full kit - to be placed in a prominent position close to the town's market.

The project will be unique as it has been many years since a war memorial has been commissioned on this scale in the UK.

A major portion of the £10,000 Lottery award will go to publishing a new book, which will be written by local author John Garwood, an expert on the Chorley Pals, and Mr Williams, the appeal secretary, who is also a World War One historian.

It is hoped that the statue will be unveiled in July 2009 - 93 years after the Pals went over the top on that fateful morning.