On your right, these War Memorial Fountains mark Southport’s main civic memorial... and they change the story of this elegant street a bit. The names here were not grand figures. They were working men from the resort itself: men who pushed bath chairs, drove the pier tram, kept hotel kitchens and bars going, and launched the lifeboat when others stayed ashore.
In nineteen fourteen, Kitchener’s Pals scheme promised that mates could enlist and serve together. Southport answered in numbers, sending men into the seventeenth and nineteenth battalions of the King’s Liverpool Regiment. That sounded comforting at first... neighbours with neighbours, workmates with workmates. But it meant whole communities could be shattered together in France.
Think of Ralph Rylance here too. He came from Blackburn, worked for a solicitor’s firm, played for a team called the Lawyers, and helped turn Southport from rugby to football in eighteen eighty-one. The same football community, fair to say, later saw its sons go to the Somme. These names are the town’s hidden workforce, remembered in stone. When you’re ready, head on towards Southport Pier, about seven minutes away. This memorial is accessible at all hours.
