Darwen War Memorial is a Grade II* listed building in the Blackburn with Darwen local planning authority area, England. A 20th century War memorial.
Darwen War Memorial
- WRENN ID
- hushed-gallery-wren
- Grade
- II*
- Local Planning Authority
- Blackburn with Darwen
- Constituency
- Rossendale and Darwen MP: Andy MacNae (Lab)
- Country
- England
- Type
- War memorial
- Period
- 20th century
- Address
- Darwen War Memorial, Bold Venture Park
- OS grid reference
- SD 689 218
- Coordinates
- 53.69227, -2.472
- Source
- Historic England listing
Description
The Darwen War Memorial is a First World War memorial erected in 1921 by the Municipal Borough of Darwen. It features a bronze sculpture by LF Roslyn and is made of a bronze statue on a sandstone pedestal.
The memorial is situated on a paved five-stepped platform near the north-east entrance to Bold Venture Park, which was laid out between 1889 and 1914. It is positioned to be viewed against the backdrop of a lake surrounded by mature trees.
The structure consists of a tall, square sandstone ashlar pedestal on a stepped base, topped by a statue of winged Victory standing on a globe. She holds a laurel wreath in her left hand and an olive branch in her right. The pedestal has a deep cornice and features a torus and cavetto moulding above the plinth.
The front (south) face of the pedestal is inscribed with a tribute to over 1,200 citizens of the town who lost their lives in the Great War from 1914 to 1918, as well as those who died in the war of 1939 to 1945. Above this inscription is a carved relief of the Darwen Borough arms, flanked by inverted torches.
The west, north, and east faces of the pedestal have inset bronze reliefs depicting an infantryman, a nurse, and a seaman, respectively. Each panel features a bronze laurel wreath above and a carved inscription below, representing HONOUR, HUMANITY, and FREEDOM. The details of their dress and weaponry are carefully depicted.
The inscriptions on the plinth include "LEST WE FORGET" on the front, "IS IT NOTHING TO YOU / ALL YE WHO PASS BY" on the west (a quotation from Lamentations 1:12), "THEY DIED NOT IN VAIN" on the north, and "THEIR NAME LIVETH FOR EVERMORE" on the east.
The sides and rear of the platform are enclosed by a series of short tapering posts, with four on the sides and two at the rear. The terminal posts are adorned with carved lions, while the intervening chains have been removed.
The Darwen War Memorial was listed at Grade II in 1984 and stands within Bold Venture Park, which is a Grade II registered landscape.
Local climate
Darwen War Memorial sits in one of the wettest parts of the UK, with an average of 1,200 mm of rain a year. This makes it wetter than 91% of listed buildings in the UK. Its exposure to wind-driven rain is greater than that of 86% of listed buildings.
It experiences an average of 44 freeze-thaw cycles a year, more than 85% of listed buildings. Of these, 24 follow at least 1 mm of rain in the preceding 48 hours. Average temperatures at this location have risen by 0.3°C per decade since 1991.
Averages for 1991–2020; temperature trend 1991–2025. Figures describe the wider area (a grid cell of roughly 10 km), not the individual site. Contains modified Copernicus Climate Change Service information 2026.
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