Rev Alan Sorensen, former Greenock minister and also a Deputy Lieutenant who has previously represented the Lord-Lieutenant at the Port Glasgow Remembrance Parade continues his short series of reflections on local war memorials.
Coming into Port Glasgow, there are a few striking pieces of public art you can't fail to notice.
The giant stainless steel 'Shipbuilders of Port Glasgow' is the most recent addition. Standing 10 metres tall, and unveiled in 2022, it says all you need to know about the Port and the famed workmanship of so many of the Portonians.
Across the road is the 2012 installation called 'Endeavour', whose curved steel is like a ship's hull in the colours of the famous Cunard ships such as the Queen Mary, Queen Elizabeth and the 'QE2.
But next to that is the Port Glasgow Cenotaph...which was very nearly not there at all.
Originally, it was proposed to site it in the park, but it was discovered that there was no bedrock to support a solid granite memorial. The local press has articles recording the grumbling at the time, but it does also acknowledge that whatever site might be chosen there would always be some who are unhappy!
The Fore Street position was finally agreed upon, even though it, too, would require a vast amount of piling to support the monument.
Sunday, October 23, 1921 duly arrived and Sir Hugh Shaw Stewart, Bart., Vice Lord-Lieutenant of the County, attended on behalf of His Majesty the King.
The press recorded that the crowd was “the largest assembly ever gathered in Port Glasgow”, which is no surprise given that Provost Mackie, in his address, paid tribute to the 3,000 or so who went to war from the Port. Of that number, 319 had returned maimed and wounded, and 342 are recorded on the bronze tablets as having paid the ultimate price.
On Remembrance Sunday in 1952, the names of another 110 servicemen, plus 53 civilians, who died in the Second World War were added. With a total of 484 people, part of so many families, businesses and friendships, this memorial reminds us that a huge part of the Port Glasgow community has been affected by these wars.
This year, on Remembrance Sunday, we may not have the largest crowd ever assembled at the Cenotaph. However, I am sure that the community will gather as it has done over the past 103 years.
The first wreath will be laid by one of my fellow Deputy Lieutenants on behalf of His Majesty The King, and many others from the Council, community organisations and Portonian families still affected by conflict will follow.
Bands will play, some comprising local schoolchildren, and the silence will be observed.
READ MORE: Alan Sorensen tells the story of Gourock's war memorial
The problem which beset the memorial’s building was the lack of bedrock. It seems to me that the other public artworks, recalling the difficult, hard and dangerous world of shipbuilding, say something about the solid foundations of Portonians.
But the community ties and the family bonds which still bring hundreds out to Remember are, to my mind, surely the real bedrock of Port Glasgow.
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