What's in the names?
THERE are hundreds of them. Name after name. Who came back? You wonder. And who still lies in the mud of Flanders?
Who were these men which a community sought to honour in the aftermath of war?
The puzzle of these great memorial plaques is literally one of the biggest mysteries, yet, still to be solved at South Shields Museum.
They are held in storage at the building, in Ocean Road, but there is no record of where they came from.
The North East War Memorials Project (NEWMP), which seeks to locate, research and preserve commemorative war artefacts around the region, has undertaken to try to find out.
Do you know?
Are they, as they speculate, a moving relic of one of the borough's last great pits – Marsden/Whitburn Colliery which, at its peak, employed more than 1,600 men?
Not that there's any certainty. The guesswork is largely intuitive.
"The design is elaborate and looks and feels miners-style, but we are open to suggestions," says the NEWMP.
The memorial, seen here in the project's own pictures, consists of at least 22 metal panels, each about a metre long, with 50-plus names on each panel.
"It was dismantled from wherever it was mounted rather quickly, as some of the panels still have the fixing screws attached through the back," they say.
"There are at least eight panels missing. It's believed it came from Marsden Colliery when it was still in operation. However, this is unconfirmed. Do any of your readers remember such a large memorial in place at the pit? It would have been an impressive sight.
"Somebody has marked the back of the panels with a white marker indicating the layout. There were 12 panels to the left, and 12 panels to the right, but five panels are missing. There are also six panels smaller in length, of which three are missing.
"Does anybody recognise it? And what happened to the missing pieces? We would be very interested in anyone's recollections of it. There is also a heading plate which has letters missing. Is this from the same memorial? We think not."
Given the number of names, it's thought that not all of these men were casualties, but simply those who gave their service.
Coal mining was not a reserved occupation during the first half of the First World War, and it's estimated that some 30,000 men from the Durham coalfields served in the conflict.
Many would have been from Marsden Colliery, which was sunk in 1874 and which drew its workforce from in and around Marsden Village, near Souter, as far as Shields itself.
The pit closed in 1968, though Whitburn workshops continued in operation until the early 1980s.
If you know anything about the memorial, get in touch, or contact Adam Bell, assistant keeper of history at South Shields Museum, on 456 8740.
You can find the North East War Memorials Project at www.newmp.org.uk
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Saturday 04 February 2012
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