A HEARTBROKEN father has gone through the pain barrier to get a poignant tattoo in memory of his son.

Peter Goodship’s 17-year-old son, James, drowned in Lake Burwain, Foulridge, in June after getting into trouble on a makeshift wooden raft.

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Now Mr Goodship has had a detailed portrait of the teenager, taken from his last school photograph, inked on his left calf.

The 45-year-old site manager, of Duke Street, Colne, said he wanted ‘some way of always having James there’.

Lancashire Telegraph:

Tattooist John Dixon at Blood, Sweat and Tattoos in Richmond Court, Colne, took two hours to complete the intricate design.

Mr Goodship said: “I’ve got a few other tattoos, a Liverpool one and one on each arm, and I wanted something that meant I would always have him there.

“The pain is like an itchy sunburn, it’s not particularly comfortable, but I would have gladly gone through any amount of pain for James. Thankfully it was all over in one session but it took a while for the redness to disappear.

“All my friends that I used to play football with and work with contributed the money towards paying for it, which was really nice.

“John at Blood Sweat and Tattoos said he was more than happy to do it and he’s done an amazing job. People can’t believe the detail on it, it’s as good as a photograph.”

The ink was based on James’s final school photograph from Park High School in Colne, where he studied before taking up a plumbing apprenticeship.

Mr Dixon said: “It was an incredible honour to be asked to do it.

“I don’t know Peter but he came to me through a recommendation so he must have seen my work and liked it.

“Any portrait is very difficult to do and takes a huge amount of concentration.

“But Peter seemed happy with the results.”

Last month, East Lancashire coroner Richard Taylor ruled that James’s death, on June 22, was the result of ‘a very, very cruel accident’.