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Trinity School War Memorial
The school’s War Memorial is currently situated in the grounds of Trinity School, Shirley Park. The Memorial commemorates all those fallen former students (Old Mid-Whitgiftians), who lost their lives in the Great War (1914-18) and also in the Second World War (1939-45).
A fund was originally started in 1919 for the Great War Memorial, which was unveiled on November 19th 1921, in the playground of the Whitgift Middle School in Pump Pail, Old Town Croydon. It was made of Bronze and placed on an upright Granite Plinth and listed those known to have fallen in World War 1.
Following the Second World War, The Old Boys Association set up a memorial appeal fund and the names of those lost were added to the original plaque. The new Memorial was dedicated on June 29th 1949, this time at North End, the site of the Whitgift Middle School at the time.
With the school moving to Shirley Park in 1965, the Memorial stone was moved again, to its current site. By now, the name of the school had changed to Trinity School of John Whitgift and is now referred to as just Trinity School.
A service for staff and students is held around the Memorial each year during Remembrance Week and the insertion of 142 metal poppies is made into the surrounding ground to remember each of the fallen students from the Great War, plus a triple poppy to remember three brothers, who were all students at the school but lost their lives in a Zeppelin raid on their home. Each year, our ground staff plant Cyclamen in the flower bed, to represent and honour all those fallen students who gave their lives during World War 2.
Following a decade or more of tireless research, two former students of the school, Mark Gardiner and Neil Mackenzie, have been able to provide the names and details of additional former students who died in the Great War but whose names and records were unknown at the time the original Memorial was dedicated.
On 7th November 2018, we were delighted to unveil and dedicate the updated Memorial, with the additional names added to a new plaque, below the original World War 1 names. The bronze plaque of the Second World War names, was moved onto a new piece of Granite and attached to the foot, creating a wonderful new and enhanced Memorial.