About the Memorial

In the St Mary's Church, Horsefair there is a memorial listing the names of this town's soldiers who died in the Second World War. This memorial consists of three panels; one central panel containing 78 names, which dates from just after the war, and two further panels to the left and right which were added in 2003.

Mr. Harry Cowie, war veteran and vice president of the Banbury branch of the Royal British Legion, spent years researching other names which should have been on the original memorial, but were not. Thanks to his work, the two further panels with an additional 34 and 22 names were added to the left and right of the original memorial.

This website lists all of the names on all three panels. It contains all the information we have about each of the men.

We have also done independent research as described on the home page, and taken photographs of graves where possible.

The men listed on the memorial include the following:

66 who were in the Army (including 14 from the Oxford & Bucks Light Infantry and 15 from Anti-tank regiments),
38 who were in the RAF (including the Royal Air Force Volunteer Reserve),
9 who were in the Royal and Merchant Navy,
4 who were in the Royal Engineers,
3 who were in the Royal Marines,
3 who were civilians,
2 who were in the Military Police
2 who were in the Reconnaissance Corps,
1 who was in the Life Guards and
1 who was in the Royal Australian Air Force.

The youngest man on the memorial was 17 (Stuart John Quare Williams, a Cadet in the Merchant Navy) and the oldest was 61 (Richard Walter Parker, civilian).

The earliest date of death is 20/12/1939 (Donald Cranston Selby, killed at a railway crossing) and the latest is 17/10/1956 (Michael O'Carroll, accidentally shot while on guard duty in Cyprus).

To date, 3 men remain unidentified (A R Harrison, E Taylor and S Booth).