The Midland Railway Company WW1 Memorial

The Midland Railway Company was formed on 10th May 1844 and went on to become Derby’s largest employer. There are many Midland Railway employees buried in Nottingham Road Cemetery. Here we pay tribute to those who died serving their country during WWI. These men are commemorated on the bench, which was unveiled on 13th January 2023, next to the Commonwealth War Graves Commission (CWGC) Soldier’s plot. This site was selected as it is close to Chaddesden Sidings and the former railway workshops.

On Thursday 15th December 1921 at 11:45am, the Midland Railway Memorial on Midland Road was unveiled by Charles Booth, the Chairman of the Company. The Midland Railway Company was the only railway company to have its head offices outside London. Of the 22,941 employees who fought in WWI, sadly 2,833 died. The Company decided to place a permanent memorial in a prominent position at the Company’s headquarters, as a tribute to these men.

The memorial was designed and erected under the personal supervision of Sir Edwin L Lutyens R.A., the designer of the Cenotaph in London. It is 32 feet high, surmounted by a sarcophagus, upon which is laid the figure of a fighting man, and is flanked by wing walls terminated by bastions 10 feet high, and enclosed by low seats. The memorial bears in large letters the following inscription “To the brave men of the Midland Railway who gave their lives in the Great War”. Placed within laurel wreaths is the Midland Railway Company’s coat of arms. On the walls, bastions and podium, are engraved the names of the Midland Railway men who gave their lives.

Families of those who died were sent a memorial volume, giving a list, in alphabetical order, of all those inscribed on the memorial, together with a picture of the memorial and details of war operations that involved Midland Railway employees. Free travel was provided for the parents, widows and children of those who died to visit the memorial.

Nineteen of the men commemorated on the Lutyens’s memorial are known to be buried in Nottingham Road Cemetery. There are graves and headstones of other Midland Railway employees who are not commemorated on the memorial as they died later of their injuries, or were called up as reservists at the start of WWI.

The Midland Railway Study Centre at the Museum of Making, www.midlandrailwaystudycentre.org.uk contains a wealth of information about the Midland Railway Company and its employees. Many of these resources can be accessed online and add to the picture of the contribution of the Midland Railway Company in WWI. These resources include a copy of the memorial volume listing all those commemorated on the WWI memorial