War Memorial from Dalreoch Church

Image: © Lairich Rig Taken: 14 Jan 2013

For context, see Image; the building behind the memorial is the one that appears at the far left in that picture, and the direction of view is more or less the same. The memorial is now located just to the south of the church halls of the West Kirk, but it originally stood beside Dalreoch Church. Dalreoch Church, now demolished, was located not far from here, at about Image; it was built in 1873, and it was designed by Dumbarton's town architect John McLeod (Image). The same architect was responsible for the West Kirk itself: see Image The Dalreoch and West Bridgend congregations eventually merged, and they would meet at the West Bridgend church building, which became known as the West Kirk. The Dalreoch Church building was later demolished (in 1984), so the war memorial associated with that congregation was brought here. This is a memorial for those who died in the First World War. Another First World War memorial, made of bronze, is located within the West Kirk itself; that bronze memorial is the one associated with the (pre-merger) West Bridgend congregation. The unveiling of the two war memorials is reported in the 15th October 1921 edition of the "Lennox Herald" newspaper. Neither of the two bears any text identifying which congregation it is associated with, but there was no need to do so before the congregations merged, since the two memorials were, until then, located beside different church buildings. The Dalreoch memorial, shown in the present photograph, is described in the newspaper article as being in the form of an Ionic cross (i.e., a Celtic cross), and the official presentation was presided over by the minister R.A.Orr. "The stone was supplied by Bailie Gilfillan, sculptor, Dumbarton"; this is a reference to John Gilfillan, on whom see Image (a bailie is a municipal magistrate; see the inscription at the link just given). The newspaper article also notes that Dalreoch was the first of the local churches to have its war memorial placed outside the church. The smaller memorial on the right is for Private William C. Douglas, Royal Army Medical Corps, who died on the 7th December 1916, aged 19. A burial ground was formerly associated with the original church here at West Bridgend. It has largely been cleared away (Image), and the very few remaining stones are located near this spot: Image / Image

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