The Pilton Story has moved out of its long-term office in Pilton Church Hall and has relocated its base to the nearby 51 The Rock. It is still available and enthusiastic to meet anyone with Pilton stories, documents and/or photographs to share. Although the frantic rush of the early years has slowed to a trickle, the online archive has reached some 800 items about this amazing community. Followers of the Facebook group and Piltonians everywhere are urged to continue making submissions either here or through the usual email address submissions@thepiltonstory.org, or to contact Martin Haddrill on m.haddrill@btinternet.com.
New WWI Memorial to Pilton’s Men and Women
A new World War One memorial to the men and women of Pilton is due to be unveiled by Barnstaple Mayor Ian Roome in Rotary Gardens at 2pm on Saturday 8th September.
The memorial plinth awaits the finished plaque
In the last two years, The Pilton Story and North Devon Council have collected the stories of seven of the men who fought and died in the Great War to tell more about them than just the usual name, rank, service number and regiment. These stories, which share something about their lives, are being told on a new plaque to go on the fourth plinth in the centre of Rotary Gardens (left).
They are representative of the stories of the 39 men of Pilton inscribed on the plaque below the memorial west window of the Ancient Priory Church of St Mary, and of the 340 men of Pilton who went to war and came home at the end of the conflict, whose names are on a board in the South Porch.
In addition to the concise versions of their stories on the plinth, more complete versions are being posted on The Pilton Story archive over the next few weeks. The stories of Harry Fry-Vicary, Claudius Wilfred Dix, William James Norman and Frank Norman are already there. Whilst the memorial remembers both the men and women of Pilton, we have been unable to find specific records of the many women of Pilton who also must have served and sustained the war effort. This regrettable omission does not in any way diminish their enormous contribution to the ultimately successful conflict.