Woodchurch (Kent) War Memorial

[Gary Samson]

The war memorial at Woodchurch, Kent was designed and constructed by L. A. Turner of 42 Lamb’s Conduit St., WC1. Does anyone on the Forum have any information on this company or know of any other examples of their WWI memorials? Many thanks.

Gary

[Jonathan Saunders]

Gary wasnt the IWM involved in amassing a central War Memorial register a couple of years ago ... was it Friends of War MEmorials or something ... someone else beat me to it, but when I contacted them about my local memorial I had details of the Stonemason and design etc. A long shot but it might be worth contacting the IWM enquiries or reading room.

As a matter of interest is it an unusual design? Can you post a photo on the thread?

[Gary Samson]

Thanks for your reply, Signals. No such luck, I'm afraid. I've been in touch with Jane Furlong at the United Kingdom National Inventory of War Memorials and the memorial at Woodchurch has yet to be included so I've agreed to complete a thorough survey for the project along with those from a number of surrounding villages. I'll dig out and post a photo of the memorial when I have a little more time this evening.

Gary

[Gary Samson]

As promised, here's an image of the war memorial at Woodchurch. It includes names for the Second as well as First World War (or were the intervening years just a lull in the fighting - discuss). I'm not sure it's anything special architecturally but as a memorial to the young men from the village who sacrificed their lives it has a special place in the hearts of everyone who lives in Woodchurch. As a kid I must have walked past this memorial dozens and dozens of times on my way to games and adventures in the fields around the church but often stopped to wonder who these people were and why they had their own special memorial. I now feel privileged, tempered with a sense of responsibility and personal obligation, that I have the opportunity to research what these men did, the hardships and horrors they experienced, and keep the memory of their selfless heroism and gallantry alive.

Gary

[Clive Maier]

Your man could conceivably be Laurence A Turner, 1864-1957, although now I have seen the photograph I tend to doubt it. As you say, it is not a particularly distinguished design although thoroughly sincere. For me, the square form sits very uneasily upon the octagonal base.

This is from Edwardian Architecture: A biographical dictionary, A Stuart Grey, Wordsworth Editions, 1988:

The seventh son of the Rev JR Turner, rector of Wroughton, Wiltshire, and the brother of the architect Thackeray Turner, Laurence Turner was educated at Marlborough and then at Oxford. He was apprenticed to John McCulloch.

The beauty and quality of his woodcarvings won Turner a reputation with GF Bodley, FC Eden, Walter Tapper, Robert Schultz Weir and other church architects of the time. His carvings were not in the usual line of Renaissance work but inclined more to the carved decoration of the Eastern Roman Empire, like that at Baalbek. This is evident in the work he did for Dunn, Watson and Curtis on the Scottish Provident Institution building (1905) and the Scottish Widows’ Fund (1915) in Lombard Street, EC3. It is equally clear in the work he did for his brother, Thackeray Turner, on the houses of the Grosvenor Estate in Mayfair and Belgravia. Laurence Turner also did work for Henry T Hare at University College, Bangor, North Wales, and for Edward Warren on the Bodley Memorial, Holy Trinity, Prince Consort Road, SW7. He carved William Morris’s tomb at Kelmscott designed by Philip Webb, and Norman Shaw’s tomb at Hampstead designed by Ernest Newton.

Turner taught by his drawings and held exacting standards, preferring to lose money rather than economise in the work.

[HERITAGE PLUS]

Laurence Arthur Turner gets just the briefest of mentions in The Marlborough College Register 1843-1933 as follows:

Son of Rev.J.R.Turner, Wroughton.

born 9 July 1864

Marlborough College 1877-81

Rifle Corps Shooting Team 1880-81

Carver and Modeller

Address(1933) - 56 Doughty Street. London, W.C.

[Gary Samson]

Many thanks for these biographical details, Clive and Heritage Plus. I feel a trip to the Imperial War Museum coming on. It may well be that extra information already held in the UKNIWM database on other memorials designed by L.A. Turner will positively identify the person responsible for the memorial in Woodchurch.

Gary