Byfleet War Memorial

First World War memorial, erected in about 1924 to the design of the architect Gerald Warren by the builder Walter George Tarrant with further inscriptions added following the Second World War in 1974.

MATERIALS: built of red brick with Portland stone dressings and bronze plaques.

DESCRIPTION: the war memorial stands at the corner of High Road and Chertsey Road. It takes the design and form of a cenotaph; a monument erected in honour of the Fallen of Byfleet, many of whose remains are elsewhere. The memorial is rectangular in plan and has a stone base, a brick plinth with a stone coping, and then the main shaft in red brick which is surmounted by several stepped ashlar courses; a representation of a tomb. Mounted onto the west side of the monument is a large bronze plaque, which is inscribed: 1914/ 1918/ THIS MEMORIAL WAS ERECTED/ TO THE GLORY OF GOD/ AND IN GRATEFUL MEMORY OF THE MEN OF/ THE PARISH OF BYFLEET/ WHO GAVE THEIR LIVES IN THE GREAT WAR/ NOT GRUDGINGLY OR OF NECESSITY/ BUT THAT TRUTH AND JUSTICE MIGHT PREVAIL/ (NAMES)/ WE GRATEFULLY HONOUR AND REMEMBER THESE NAMES. At the foot of the monument, beneath the bronze plaque, is an ashlar tablet with a moulded top. It has an incised inscription set on a fielded panel: THE MEN OF THE BRITISH EMPIRE/ WHO WERE KILLED IN ACTION OR/ DIED OF WOUNDS DURING THE/ GREAT WAR NUMBERED 908,371. Two small bronze plaques placed to each side of the main plaque are inscribed with the dates 1939 and 1945 and the names of 14 people who died during the Second World War.