Cllr. Hamish Pollock reports: “The Carshalton & Clockhouse Local Committee which I chair held its 2^nd working party meeting in as many months to discuss the WW2 memorial(s) recently. It became clear to all those present that the WW2 memorial is becoming virtually impossible to achieve in the original format that was envisaged by the local committee of early 2010, namely the fallen of WW2 inscribed individually in a manner to match/resemble that of the existing WW1 memorial.

The working party as recently constituted includes 2 representatives from the local branch of the Royal British Legion, officers from the Sutton Council’s archives (Kath Shawcross who has special responsibility for war memorials), planning consultants (Eimear Murphy/Paul Barker) and construction & property (Paul Algeo and colleagues), and interested persons including ex-Councillor John Dodwell and Andrew Arnold, historian as well as Sam Barker, local committee co-ordinator and chair and vice chair of the committee.  The Carshalton Society’s representative was instrumental in the restoration of the Hermitage at Carshalton House (St. Philomena’s School) opened last year by myself as Deputy Mayor.

Anticipated total costs of the project to have inscribed names now in stone (to match the rededicated WW1 memorial) have increased from the original budget figure of £35K to around £80K including fees for consultants and officer time.

This increase in costs is partly owing to the need for Portland stone to be used as a material, with stone inscriptions rather than bronze plaques, and to follow a design that is required in keeping with the Carshalton Conservation Area and Listed Building status of the existing memorial.  The extent of the memorial(s) would have to increase if we are to accommodate a significant increase in the number of names of the fallen that have been uncovered recently (see below).

The local committee will have to decide over coming weeks to:-

a)     Carry on with the project as originally envisaged. Possibly with external funding. This would mean possibly raising funds and also voting additional funds of the order to a combined figure of £45K out of Carshalton & Clockhouse local committee’s limited public realm funds –possibly taking up part of the 2012-13 allocation and a part even of 2013-14’s!  (The significance of 2014 being a centenary of the outbreak WW1 is of course looming up on us all!)

Or (if permitted by the Council’s current rules of its public realm spending) some or all of the following options:-

b)     Provide an embellishment to the existing WW1 stone memorial to further commemorate the fallen of WW2 – say by additional inscriptions. The Royal British Legion have been asked to come up with suggestions as to how this might be done. We think that a public subscription may be the answer to the massive shortfall of funds.

c)      A new Book of Remembrance in bound leather binding/vellum etc. in a new glass case to be housed in the new Westcroft Centre/Carshalton Library to include all the 450 or so names of the fallen (which has risen from 270 in the current book of remembrance, to about 450 names if one includes all the names of the fallen that have discovered by the local historian Andrew Arnold).

d)     An interactive web page on the council’s web site (that is currently being revamped) for all WW1 and WW2 fallen from Carshalton.  This could show photographs and military backgrounds to the fallen men and women for instance, far more than could ever be covered by a stone inscription.

We would be very interested to hear from local residents and relatives of the fallen of the parish of Carshalton.