The area of Lathom and Burscough in common with many other villages of the United Kingdom is patriotic whilst continuing to pay reverence to the war dead of the district.
The resurgence of commemoration in particular at Armistice Day is very encouraging, long it should remain so. The conflict in Afghanistan and the previous Iraq war has brought to the fore the ‘job’ that our servicemen and women do. This new sense of patriotism is most refreshing to those, who daily go into conflict not knowing the outcome, never knowing if they will see loved ones again. Let us not delude ourselves it is not soldiers them selves who choose conflict, but leaders and politicians who send them forth, in to a task they themselves would not contemplate, but ask others to do just that.
Yet a ‘true’ leader may argue, that it is harder to send men into battle, than to go in oneself, that may be so. But it does have more credability when the ‘true’ leader has witnessed battle first hand, he then knows what he is asking others to do. How many of our leaders can lay claim to that ?
We ought never to forget who they are, or what they did, or what sacrifices they or their families may have made. For it is not just the dead that suffer, it is also those that may grow old, be it they have a full body or limbless it is often said they suffer the most, and yet complain the least, a soldier is but a soldier, he knows the risks, he may have to pay the price.
Three public memorials exist, in the village of Newburgh adjacent to the church to commemorate the fallen in two world wars. Lathom War Memorial situated at the former entrance to the Remount Depot 1914-1919, on Hall Lane, Lathom. This memorial commemorates those who worked on the Lathom Estate pre The Great War and those who attended the chapel in prayer, as would have been the case for the WW2 personnel as by that time the estate had ceased to exist.
The third and not least, is the Lathom & Burscough War Memorial situated on Liverpool Road North, Burscough, at the traffic lights with Junction Lane. This the ‘council’ memorial erected by partial public subscription in 1921, inaugurated in 1922.
The village of Westhead does not contain a public memorial, one is however situated inside St James Church, Westhead. Please refer to the appropiate pages in this category for full information on all these memorials.
The Lathom & Burscough Memorial has all the Newburgh names, plus most of those from the Lathom Memorial in Hall Lane, together with the names form St James church with some exceptions. It was this precedent that allowed the researcher, Richard Houghton, the facility to have all the missing men (38) from either of the four villages added to this memorial in 2004, again in 2008 (7) with the full consent of Burscough Parish Council, who arranged the contractor and undertook the cost of said work.
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