Now stranded in the middle of a busy roundabout and occupying the last scrap of what was once Stockwell Common is the Stockwell War Memorial and adjacent Memorial Mural.
Erected in 1922 and built to a design by 31 year old architect, Frank Twydals Dear, the monument was praised by The Royal Academy for possessing, “a tower of excellent proportion and refined detail, depending for its effect on good massing and simple lines.”
[Opening ceremony, Wednesday 3 May, 1922]
A Chelsea-based sculptor, Benjamin Clemens, designed the figure of Remembrance which bears the simple message below: “To the Stockwell Men who Served in the Great War, 1914–1919.”
Greenwich-born Frederick Francis undertook the stone carving, while a Dr. Caiger donated the four-faced clock – perhaps as an act of remembrance for his only child Frederick who was killed at the Somme in 1916.
[Archive postcard view, c.1920s]
Local jeweller and clockmaker Sidney Sanders – who opened a shop in Brixton Road in 1908 – was originally going to provide the clock, but after he insisted that the company’s name appeared on the clock face, his offer was rejected.
The funding for the memorial was raised by the enterprising Memorial Committee, who organised numerous fund-raising events, such as these examples listed by the Vauxhall Civic Society:
…on the first anniversary of Armistice Day, the Stockwell Palladium Cinema at 211 Clapham Road (the building now houses a café) hosted an evening of Mary Pickford and Charlie Chaplin films and Dr. Pearson appealed for donations.
There were also fancy dress dances, concerts and fêtes at which local celebrities were encouraged to give their services, as well as their cash.
There was even a minstrel show, which was then a popular and acceptable form of entertainment. The troupe, the well-known Police Minstrels, performed in evening dress and blackface.
The names on the memorial commemorate the 574 dead of the First World War, all of whom had lived within half a mile of Stockwell Common.
A book by local resident Naomi Lourie Klein entitled, “These Were Our Sons: Stories from Stockwell War Memorial,” uncovered more details about these men, including:
- Thomas Skudder, who died in an accident testing grenades
- Harold Hill, whose name was found in an old book bought at an Oxfam shop – and traced back to Stockwell
- Frank Mason, at 16, the youngest man traced on the Memorial
- Henry Dooley, sentenced to a year’s hard labour
- Thomas Pilgrim – a career soldier who died of pneumonia
- Sydney Kemp, the prison warder promoted to officer
- Edward Winter, who dropped his German surname
- Henry Nadaud, a Major, remembered at Westminster Cathedral
- Jesse Goff, cheerful on the eve of the Battle of the Somme
Reviewing the book, Ian Hislop said, “Klein makes a memorial come alive – and records lives that deserve to be, as the hope remains, Not Forgotten.”
More details: www.elefantbooks.com
Right next to the Memorial can be found the Stockwell Memorial Mural, which is painted on the top part of a deep level shelter built during the Second World War.
The first part of the mural was developed in 1999 by Brian Barnes and Myra Harris, who created a mural based on the ideas of children from Stockwell Park School.
The images draw on local history, and include a picture of James Bond, (Bond actor Roger Moore grew up in Stockwell) and artist Vincent Van Gogh who spent six months living in the area, as well as a representation of the MV Empire Windrush ship.
The second part of the mural was unveiled in June 2001 and celebrates local resident and war hero, Violette Szabo, who served during World War II as an SOE agent on two missions in occupied France.
Captured by the enemy in France in May 1944, Szabo was interrogated and tortured, and deported to Germany where she was eventually executed at Ravensbruck concentration camp, aged just 23 years old.
The mural is dominated by a quotation from the poem, ‘For the Fallen,’ which was written by Robert Laurence Binyon, (1869-1943) and published in The Times newspaper on 21st September 1914:
With proud thanksgiving, a mother for her children,
England mourns for her dead across the sea.
Flesh of her flesh they were, spirit of her spirit,
Fallen in the cause of the free.Solemn the drums thrill: Death august and royal
Sings sorrow up into immortal spheres.
There is music in the midst of desolation
And a glory that shines upon our tears.They went with songs to the battle, they were young,
Straight of limb, true of eye, steady and aglow.
They were staunch to the end against odds uncounted,
They fell with their faces to the foe.They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them.They mingle not with their laughing comrades again;
They sit no more at familiar tables of home;
They have no lot in our labour of the day-time;
They sleep beyond England’s foam.But where our desires are and our hopes profound,
Felt as a well-spring that is hidden from sight,
To the innermost heart of their own land they are known
As the stars are known to the Night;As the stars that shall be bright when we are dust,
Moving in marches upon the heavenly plain,
As the stars that are starry in the time of our darkness,
To the end, to the end, they remain.
Further reading:
Stockwell Memorial Mural [London Mural Preservation Society]
Violette Szabó [violetteszabo.org]
Stockwell War Memorial Mural [Vauxhall Civic Society]
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Hello Mike Urban
Thanks for this excellent piece. Great photos too!
Naomi
Friends of Stockwell War Memorial & Gardens
An excellent article really well written and researched. Great photos as well.