Memorials Of The Great War

War Memorial of the Month - August 2017  

Midland Railways, Derby

click on the images to enlarge

 To protect and promote the spirit and substance of the work of Sir Edwin Lutyens OM

As with so many of the memorials commemorating company employees, the commissioning of the memorial for the staff of the Midland Railway Company appears to have been straightforward and uncontroversial.

It takes the form of a cenotaph on a pylon with apsidal ends and is similar to the memorial at Rochdale (July 2015) but without the stone flags and being made in Portland stone rather than granite.

The memorial was unveiled by Charles Booth, the company’s chairman, on 15 December 1921 and was built by J Parnell and Son of Rugby at a cost of £10,309.  Lutyens was deputed to choose the sculptor for the body on top of the memorial but, frustratingly, we do not know the choice that he made.  It might have been Derwent Wood, with whom he worked upon other memorials, but this is speculation.

Location: Midland Road, Derby, DE1 2SL

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