Service marks 100 years of Alcester Memorial Cross

THE Last Post sounded and two minute’s silence observed as the names of the fallen were read out at the 100th anniversary of the Alcester Memorial Cross which was cleaned and refurbished in advance of a special service last Saturday.

People gathered at the Grade II-listed monument which was originally unveiled on 25th September in 1921 by the then Lord Bishop of Coventry Huyshe Yeatman-Biggs, to honour the 47 men from Alcester and Oversley who paid the ultimate price in the Great War.

Alcester Town Council, Alcester Court Leet and Church Street properties in the town situated near the cross at St Nicholas Church all contributed to the £3,000 raised for the repair work.

At Saturday’s event Mike Gittus, chairman of the Alcester branch of The Royal British Legion, welcomed everyone and thanked those responsible for financing and organising the refurbishment.

The War Memorial takes the form of a medieval cross and bears the inscription, “Pass not this stone in sorrow but in pride; and may you live as nobly as they died.” The other three inscribed sides contain lists of those men of Alcester and Oversley who gave their lives in wartime.

Reverend Julian Davey then commemorated and re-dedicated the memorial cross and said: “This cross in Alcester, like the Cross of Christ, is above all a symbol of hope. It reminds us of the hope of the Resurrection, of the promise of eternal life and of the fact that, in Christ, death is overcome, and suffering is transformed into rejoicing.”

This was followed by a blessing and the singing of the National Anthem.