VICTORY NEARS WAR MEMORIAL MAY RISE AGAIN AFTER 25 YEARS

LEST WE

F RGET WHEN HURRICANE winds battered southern Britain in the Great Storm of 1987, a memorial to a Kent village’s fallen was destroyed.

Twenty-five years on, despite the efforts of parishioners, it is still a ruin, with little more than a battered stone base on which wreaths can be left.

There are, however, hopes that the Milton Regis memorial will be repaired in time for the 2014 centenary of the outbreak of the First World War following the creation of a war memorial action group, set up by groups in response to a campaign by The Sunday

Telegraph about the plight of many of the nation’s monuments.

When the memorial was erected in the grounds of Holy Trinity church in 1920, hundreds of people turned out for a dedication service and covered it in flowers, including a posy that read “To Dear Daddy”.

It bore the names of two men who died in the Boer War and six killed in the First World War and continued to be the focal point for Remembrance Sunday services, with the names of brothers Pte Raymond Davies and Pte Kenneth Davies added after the Second World War. It was then severely damaged in the storm, but plaques naming the fallen were rescued and put on a nearby monument in Sittingbourne.

The milton regis war memorial Project was setup to restore the monument and has raised £20,000 in six years but needs another £15,000.

“There have been lots of meetings and discussions, but no memorial,” said Keith Nevols, 44, a member of the church council. “Each year we hear that Remembrance Sunday is the target date. Then it passes and is the next target and so on. Meanwhile, each November 11, we have the absurd sight of local councillors and war veterans laying wreaths at a rock, which had formed the base. It would be nice if we could pay our respects to a proper memorial.”

The campaigners were given new hope last month when the Heritage Lottery Fund, which distributes National Lottery money, announced that it was creating a “war memorials action group”, involving other heritage organisations, to ensure that the nation’s memorials are in good condition by the 2014 centenary.

The Milton Regis memorial group has contacted the designer behind its project to see if he can produce a “pared down” version and plans to apply for money from the Heritage Lottery Fund to make up the shortfall.

Elvie Lowe, a member of the memorial group, said: “It is getting very difficult to raise funds — a grant would be wonderful.”

It would also ensure a fitting tribute to those who sacrificed their lives fighting for their country.

Their number include Major George Ray, who had been decorated for gallantry before his death, aged 31, trying to help a wounded comrade at Magersfontein in the Boer War in 1899 and who is named on the Milton Regis plaque.

If you know of a war memorial in your area in need of repair, please let us know by emailing warmemorial@telegraph.co.uk or writing to Lest We Forget Campaign, The Sunday Telegraph, 111 Buckingham Palace Road, London, SW1W 0DT.

The Milton memorial, Major George Ray and the site now, below