The memorial is in the form of a Malta Cross with a dedication to the men who gave their lives in World War I, World War II and all other conflicts on the front face of a plinth.
Each side of the plinth has an inscription from one of the poets.
The main front face dedication
IN HONOURED MEMORY OF
THOSE WHO GAVE THEIR LIVES
IN 1914-1918 AND 1939-1945
WORLD WARS AND IN ALL
OTHER CONFLICTS
Epitaph by John Maxwell Adams on left hand face
WHEN YOU GO HOME TELL
THEM OF US AND SAY
FOR YOUR TOMORROWS
WE GAVE OUR TODAY
John Maxwell Edmonds had worked for the War Office as a code breaker during World War I. It is one of 12 such epitaphs that he had written as suggestions of epitaphs for memorials to be erected after the war.
"John Maxwell Edmonds (21 January 1875 – 18 March 1958) was an English classicist, poet, and dramatist who is notable as the author of celebrated epitaphs.
Edmonds was born in Stroud, Gloucestershire on 21 January 1875. His father was a schoolmaster and later the vicar of Great Gransden, Huntingdonshire, while his mother was the daughter of a self-made Cornish cloth manufacturer. He was educated at Oundle School before going up to Jesus College, Cambridge in 1896 as a Classical Scholar. He was taught at Oundle by R. P. Brereton and J. H. Vince and at Cambridge under Edwin Abbott Abbott. Periods of illness which had originally made him delay his university career later forced him to be absent from university for several terms, but he nevertheless recovered to take a first in his tripos in 1898.
He taught at Repton School and King's School, Canterbury before returning to Cambridge University to lecture.
Edmonds is credited with authorship of a famous epitaph in the War Cemetery in Kohima which commemorates the fallen of the Battle of Kohima in April 1944.
When you go home, tell them of us and say
For your tomorrow, we gave our today."
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Extract from Laurence Binyon Poem 'For The Fallen' on right hand face
THEY SHALL GROW NOT OLD
AS WE THAT ARE LEFT GROW OLD
AGE SHALL NOT WEARY THEM
NOR THE YEARS CONDEMN AT
THE GOING DOWN OF THE SUN
AND IN THE MORNING WE WILL
REMEMBER THEM
For The Fallen
The second quote is an extract from the poem 'For The Fallen' by Laurence Binyon. It is the fourth stanza of the poem and that stanza has been adopted by the Royal British Legion as an Exhortation for ceremonies of Remembrance to commemorate fallen Servicemen and women.
"Laurence Binyon composed his best known poem while sitting on the cliff-top looking out to sea from the dramatic scenery of the north Cornish coastline. A plaque marks the location at Pentire Point, north of Polzeath. However, there is also a small plaque on the East Cliff north of Portreath, further south on the same north Cornwall coast, which also claims to be the place where the poem was written.
The poem was written in mid September 1914, a few weeks after the outbreak of the First World War. During these weeks the British Expeditionary Force had suffered casualties following its first encounter with the Imperial German Army at the Battle of Mons on 23 August, its rearguard action during the retreat from Mons in late August and the Battle of Le Cateau on 26 August, and its participation with the French Army in holding up the Imperial German Army at the First Battle of the Marne between 5 and 9 September 1914.
Laurence said in 1939 that the four lines of the fourth stanza came to him first. These words of the fourth stanza have become especially familiar and famous, having been adopted by the Royal British Legion as an Exhortation for ceremonies of Remembrance to commemorate fallen Servicemen and women.
Laurence Binyon was too old to enlist in the military forces but he went to work for the Red Cross as a medical orderly in 1916. He lost several close friends and his brother-in-law in the war."
The full poem is as follows
With proud thanksgiving, a mother for her children,
England mourns for her dead across the sea.
Flesh of her flesh they were, spirit of her spirit,
Fallen in the cause of the free.
Solemn the drums thrill: Death august and royal
Sings sorrow up into immortal spheres.
There is music in the midst of desolation
And a glory that shines upon our tears.
They went with songs to the battle, they were young,
Straight of limb, true of eye, steady and aglow.
They were staunch to the end against odds uncounted,
They fell with their faces to the foe.
They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them.
They mingle not with their laughing comrades again;
They sit no more at familiar tables of home;
They have no lot in our labour of the day-time;
They sleep beyond England's foam.
But where our desires are and our hopes profound,
Felt as a well-spring that is hidden from sight,
To the innermost heart of their own land they are known
As the stars are known to the Night;
As the stars that shall be bright when we are dust,
Moving in marches upon the heavenly plain,
As the stars that are starry in the time of our darkness,
To the end, to the end, they remain.
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