A series of events will take place this month to celebrate the unveiling of a statue to remember the First World War bravery of the Chorley Pals.

The Pals, otherwise known as Y Company, 11th (Service) Battalion East Lancashire Regiment, left the town in February 1915 to fight in World War One.

An appeal for the project was first launched three years ago and work began at the Union Street site on January 20.

The £80,000 memorial is now nearing completion and the statue will be unveiled by Lindsay Hoyle MP at 2pm on Sunday, February 28, 95 years after the men paraded on the market square.

Chorley Pals Memorial secretary and co-founder, Steve Williams, said: “The concrete core for the seven foot high plinth has been manufactured by contractors and now awaits the stone panels with the names of the original 225 Pals engraved on them.

“The eight Portland stone panels are due here next week, having been engraved by the Commonwealth War Graves Commission at their facility at Arras in northern France.”

Work on casting the eight foot high bronze statue of a First World War soldier started this week and will take about 10 days.

Trustees intend to travel from the foundry in Essex on Monday, February 15, to see it completed.

Chorley Library is hosting a number of events to coincide with the big day.

From Monday, February 15, until Friday, March 19, there will be an exhibition in the foyer about the Pals.

At 7.30pm on Tuesday, February 23, there will be an illustrated talk in the meeting room entitled ‘The history of the Chorley Pals’.

On Tuesday, March 16, at 2pm Steve will be giving a further illustrated talk entitled ‘The Chorley Pals Memorial – from idea to unveiling’. It will include video footage shot during the three years of the project.

Visitors need to obtain their tickets in advance from the community history section at the library.

Steve also revealed the project had become the subject of world-wide interest after a website, www.chorleypalsmemorial.org.uk was developed by his son, Craig.

He said: “We had more than 25,000 viewings of its pages in January.

“Visitors to the site have been recorded as far away as New Zealand, China and North America, although over half the hits are known to come from the UK.”