Packed lectures hear of impact of WW1 on Ballynahinch area

Packed lectures hear of impact of WW1 on Ballynahinch area

27 June 2012

AS the centenary of World War I approaches, there is continuing interest in the Co. Down men who participated in the events of 1914-18.

Young men who signed the Ulster Covenant as teenagers enlisted in considerable numbers in 1914. About 300 men from Ballynahinch and district served in WW1. Fifty of them fell in battle, and their names are recorded on the Cenotaph at the top of Main Street, erected in 1934.

Ballynahinch Market House was packed to capacity on Tuesday, June 12, for a talk given by Horace Reid on the Ballynahinch signatories of the 1912 Covenant. There was a similar turnout for a repeat on the June 19.

The dead of 1914-18 are still within living memory, and Ballynahinch families still go to France to visit graves of relatives, all along the Western Front. A group of enthusiasts from Upper Crossgare LOL 1608 regularly spend their summers tracking down graves of the Ballynahinch Fallen.

Eighty years after it was first erected, it is now emerging that Ballynahinch War Memorial, made of Portland stone, will soon need extensive maintenance.

A number of families came forward with photographs and documents after the first evening. Two families still have the large bronze medallions issued to the relatives of the dead, known as “Death Pennies”.

The event was organised by District Lodge No. 17, as part of Ballynahinch Orange Festival 2012. The Northern Ireland Children’s Hospice is the Lodge’s chosen beneficiary, and attendees on both nights gave generously to this worthy local charity.