Old Bolingbroke War Memorial

First World War memorial. Erected in 1920 to a design by Ernest Browning of Messrs Browning and Sons of Spilsby.

MATERIALS: carved in limestone.

DESCRIPTION: the war memorial stands on a small village green located at the junction of three roads. The area is grassed and the memorial is encircled by stone posts and a linked chain. The memorial is a 4.3m high Latin cross in Portland stone. It takes the form of the Cross of Sacrifice, with a crusader sword carved on the southern face of the cross. The memorial has a three-stepped octagonal base, with a two-tiered octagonal plinth above this. The cross-shaft is four-sided and tapers slightly. The memorial is inscribed with black incised lettering on all eight sides of the plinth, and on the base of the cross-shaft on the southern face. On the southern face the inscription reads (cross-base) TO THE GLORY OF GOD / AND IN GRATEFUL MEMORY OF / THE MEN OF OLD BOLINGBROKE / WHO GAVE THEIR LIVES IN THE / GREAT WAR / 1914-1918. The names, together with regiments, inscribed on the memorial are on the upper tier of the plinth, while the lower tier has a verse of scripture which reads anti-clockwise around the memorial. It reads (south face) GREATER LOVE (south-east) HATH NO MAN (east) THAN THIS (north-east) THAT A MAN (north) LAY DOWN (north-west) HIS LIFE (west) FOR HIS (south-west) FRIENDS. Below this, on the southern face, the two names of men who died in the Second World War are inscribed with the date ‘1939-1945’. This List entry has been amended to add sources for War Memorials Online and the War Memorials Register. These sources were not used in the compilation of this List entry but are added here as a guide for further reading, 5 June 2017.