Hursley Park during the Great War 1914 - 1918

As in most English villages, the only evidence today of the intrusion of the First World War into Hursley’s life is the war memorial sited on the edge of the village green, by the road. Some events relating to this period are remembered by a memorial tablet or edifice, while others are, strangely, forgotten, despite their real importance at the time. Hursley had events that fall into both categories. At the entrance to the Park by Southampton Lodge, close by the Keble Memorial School, there is a circular stone seat around a yew tree that records the assembly of the 8th Division here in 1914, but no record exists of the 28th Division that partially assembled a month later. Also the American Field Hospital which stood in the field below Merdon Castle at Standon Farm is almost forgotten, as is Lady Cooper’s Hospital which was housed in Hursley House itself. Most extraordinary of all is that all evidence of Hursley Park Aerodrome, used by the Royal Flying Corps which became the Royal Air Force at the end of the war, has completely vanished, and its only evidence is in archived papers.

Hursley war memorial

The circular stone seat by Southampton Lodge is made up of six segments, and the back rests double as tablets recording the formation and order of battle of the 8th Division. The other five tablets are a register of the companies, regiments, brigades and commanding officers who made up the 8th Division, which must have been the biggest and most spectacular event of the war in Hursley, especially when they marched off towards Southampton Docks.

The legend on the principal table reads as follows:

ERECTED BY SIR GEORGE COOPER BT. TO COMMEMORATE THE ASSEMBLING IN HURSLEY PARK IN SEPTEMBER AND OCTOBER 1914 AND THE MARCHING THROUGH THIS GATE ON 4TH NOVEMBER OF THE 8TH DIVISION MAJOR GENERAL F.J. DAVIES COMdng,

TO EMBARK FOR FRANCE

Memorial to the 8th Division 1914