Diseworth War Memorial

First World War memorial, 1921.

MATERIALS: of Breedon granite with marble tablets.

DESCRIPTION: the war memorial is located in the churchyard wall at St Michael's and All Angles Church (listed Grade II*), immediately to the left-hand side of the churchyard entrance. It comprises a vertical extension to the churchyard wall, forming a shrine of rubble stone construction, which has a triangular pedimented central column, with lower, sloping wings. Recessed inside the upper section of the central panel is a marble tablet set beneath a stone lintel. It is incised with an heraldic crest bearing the motto 'SOUVENT ME SOUVIENT', a French phase meaning 'often I remember' or 'think of me often'. Immediately below this, occupying the main area of the memorial, is a recessed marble tablet with a triangular head. The upper section of the tablet is ornamented with an incised cross enclosed by a wreath, flanked by the dates 1914 and 1918. Underneath is the dedicatory inscription which reads 'IN PROUD MEMORY OF THE DISEWORTH MEN WHO FELL IN THE / GREAT WAR, AND HAS A THANKOFFERING TO GOD FOR THE SAFE / RETURN OF SO MANY, THIS TABLET WAS ERECTED: FOUR OF THE CHURCH / BELLS WERE RECAST AND REHUNG: A FIFTH BELL WAS ADDED'. Below this are three columns of which the central column lists the names of the men who died while the two flanking columns list the names of the men who fought and returned.