Harri and Jai Sepple at the Romford War Memorial Social Club, where the original engraved oak plaques will soon be restored and displayed

Panels engraved with names of Romford war dead to be restored and displayed thanks to LBS Group donation

Ramzy Alwakeel, Reporter Tuesday, January 15, 2013
1:49 PM

After 20 years shut away in a cold, disused building, the engraved names of 387 Romford Second World War dead will this month be restored and returned to public display.

The oak panels, bearing the names of 141 civilians and 246 service personnel, belong to the town’s War Memorial Social Club – which has itself been undergoing restoration for the last two years.

Now, thanks to a donation worth thousands of pounds, they are to be taken out of storage, spruced up and put on show behind state-of-the-art security shutters.

For club secretary Jai Sepple the donation of the shutters by Dagenham firm LBS Group is a turning point in the project.

“Displaying the boards is kind of what we’ve been aiming for,” he told the Recorder. “It’s the biggest part of everything we’ve been doing for the past two years.

“The club was built to commemorate the people whose names appear on there and they’ve been locked up for so long.”

The powder-coated electric shutters will be complemented by internal floodlighting so the panels are visible day and night.

“They’ve been locked in a cold building so they’re not in the best of conditions, but they’ll clean up,” added Jai. “I think somebody’s broken in and tried to take the crest off the top because it’s damaged, but the pieces are still there.”

Jai hopes to unveil the new-look memorial board on January 24.

For more information, visit www.romfordwarmemorial.org.