The most poignant memorial of all though contains no grave. It commemorates those local men who gave their lives in two world wars in service to their country. Originally erected in 1921, the majority of names recorded there are of soldiers who served and died in The First World War (see photo).
Behind each bland inscription on the stone obelisk there are human and family tragedies. Take for example, the name of Carling – Frank enlisted in the Lancashire Fusiliers then was re-assigned to The King’s Liverpool Regiment. He was killed in 1917 aged only 19 and is commemorated at Tynecot -the great Flanders battlefied memorial to the missing. Brother Clifford enlisted in The 5th Royal Scots but died of his wounds in a POW camp two weeks after the war ended aged 20. They lived in Eastwood but are remembered on The Blackshaw Head Chapel War Memorial. Perhaps they attended Sunday School here together? Further research has revealed that their father had already been wounded at Ypres and was invalided out of the army. Younger brother Arthur was later to die in a Japanese POW camp in The Second World War. Giles Sunderland who lived in Charlestown and worked at Pry farm enlisted in The Duke of Wellington’s Regiment and was killed on the Somme in October 1916, aged 30. He was a father of five children…So the list goes on…
The First World War must have had a devastating effect for so many families in the Parish as it had for so many other communities across Britain. The numbers of Chapel-goers declined after The Great W ar but both the chapel and Sunday School stabilized their attendances up to The Second World War.