PRESS CUTTINGS

The following article about the work conducted, appeared in the Tonbridge and Malling Courier October 30th 1999, and concerns a War Memorial restored for the Edenbridge branch of the Royal British Legion. 

NEW NAMES INSCRIBED

John Froud, chairman of the Edenbridge branch of the Royal British Legion, with the town's refurbished war memorial.

NEW names were added to Edenbridge war memorial as a £5,000 refit was completed.

The stone memorial at Edenbridge and District War Memorial Hospital had cracked and deteriorated, said the chairman of Edenbridge branch of the Royal British Legion, John Froud.

Repairs had been funded by the Great Stone Bridge Trust, Edenbridge Town Council and the Royal British Legion, including flat marble panels.

Three new names were added to the list as research had uncovered three more war deaths.

The new-look war memorial will be dedicated after the memorial service at St Peter and St Paul Church and before the service at the stone on November 14.

Mr Froud told the Courier. "It looks brilliant."

This article appeared on the front page of the Kent Messenger July 19th 1999. Sadly it is about the vandalism of a War Memorial we restored in Yalding. 

GORDON WAGES WAR ON VANDALS

An angry stonemason has vowed to stake out a village's war memorial after a spate of vandal­ism.

Yalding War Memorial

Gordon Newton was commissioned by Yalding Parish Council to carry out restoration work on the structure before a rededication service on Armistice Day last year.

But last Thursday, as he drove past the memorial, he saw it had been vandalised. Yobs had thrown eggs, cut into the stone surface with a knife" scratched their names into it and daubed it with paint.

On closer inspection Mr Newton, Managing Director of the Stone Shop at 'East Farleigh, found they had also urinated over the plaques commemorating men from the village who died in the First and Second World Wars. The name Shana had been written over the stone in red crayon and beer cans, cigarette butts and broken glass littered the ground.

No Respect

Mr Newton was so upset that the following day he sent out a team of hjs staff to clear up the mess and repair the .damage - free of charge.

"What has happened to our country when people do things like this?" he said. "They have absolutely no respect for those who died on their behalf."

Mr Newton now intends to keep watch at the High Street memorial with his camera in the hope that the can catch the culprits red handed. And he urged anyone with information about the offenders to contact the police.

"Yalding Parish Council took a lot of pride in restoring it and all credit to them," he said. "Now these louts who have nothing better to do with their time wreck it. Someone knows who they are. They should pass their names on at once."

Parish Councillor Vivienne Robinson said: "Mr Newton's firm did a wonderful job on restoring the memorial, so it was understandable that he was upset.

"It's absolutely terrible that anyone should do this. The memorial is used as a gathering place for young-people, but recently we have found that Yalding seems to have become a centre for youngsters from other areas."

ANOTHER SATISFIED CUSTOMER

This quotation doesn't come from a newspaper article, but rather from a letter sent to us by David J. McNeill - Town Clerk of Burnham-on-Crouch Town Council.

"I would also take this opportunity to pass on to you the many appreciative comments the Town Councillors and I have received following the completion of the work you carried out."