There are a number of war memorials in the village; mostly they relate to World War I and they were originally sited outside the School, in the Wesleyan Chapel and in St. Luke’s Church.

World War I Memorial: School/Village Hall

The memorial on the wall of the School (now the Village Hall) was unveiled in April 1921; it specifically related to those who had died in the Great War who had also been to the School.

This meant that one name was missing; William Collyer hadn’t grown up in the village and his family moved away from the village shortly after the end of the war. William Collyer’s name was added on a separate plaque in the 1990s (although, unfortunately, with the more usual Collier spelling). Following World War II a plaque was added to include the 3 names of those who died during WWII.

Roll of Honour: Wesleyan Chapel (now in the Village Hall)

The Roll of Honour was moved from the Wesleyan Chapel to the Village Hall after the Chapel was converted in to a house.

It is our plan to build a biography page for all of these men but it will take some time! The aim is to build up a picture of what happened to these men and their families who survived the Great War. If you have any photographs or biographical information to help us with this project, please contact us, using the link, below.

The names from the two village Rolls of Honour have been collated in to a table at the bottom of this page; as we build these biographical pages, links will appear on the table.

Wesleyan Chapel: The Simpson Memorial

The Simpson family were great Chapel-goers and after the death of both Charles and Cecil Simpson in the Great War a stone memorial was erected in the Wesleyan Chapel. During the work to convert the Chapel in to a house this memorial stone was rescued from a builder’s skip and has been kept in a family garage ever since.

Keith, Patrick and Clare Wadkin launched a project to find a new permanent public home for the memorial stone in 2018. The stone was installed with the other War Memorials outside the Village Hall at a special ceremony on  June 2nd 2019.

A real village effort came together with the erection of the Simpson Memorial going a few hundred yards from the Wesleyan Chapel to the Wadkin family’s garage to its new permanent home alongside other village War Memorials outside the Village Hall. The ceremony on June 2nd 2019 was joined by members of the Simpson family and descendants of Charlie and Cecil Simpson as well as friends and members of the community.

Family members who appear in the group photographs (above) descend either from Ida Simpson (sister of Cecil and Charlie) or Donald SImpson (brother who also served in the War); Keith, Patrick and Fiona trace back to Ida and everyone else to Donald (starting from the left with the baby):

• Ella Brown – great great great uncles
• Stephen Brown – great uncles
• Patrick Wadkin – great great uncles
• Jayne Acton – great uncles
• David Brown – great uncles
• Julie Simpson – great uncles
• Gladys Simpson – uncles ( in law )
• Wendy Simpson – great uncles
• Oliver Bentley – great great great uncles
• Sheila Simpson – uncles ( in law )
• Christine Farmer – uncles
• Keith Wadkin – great uncles
• Fiona Smart – great great uncles
• Becky Smith (holding baby) – great great uncles
• Toby Smith (baby) – great great great uncles
• Arlo Dayman (toddler) – great great great uncles
• Charles Ellen Brown – great great Uncles
• Emma-Mai Dayman – great great uncles

Link to Melton Times: https://www.meltontimes.co.uk/news/people/relatives-pay-tribute-to-hickling-brothers-killed-on-somme-1-8949673

War Memorial: St. Luke’s Church (restored in November 2018 to mark the Centenary of the end of WWI).

The memorial was repainted and cleaned by Mrs Sara Parker in November 2018, ready for Remembrance Sunday – the centenary of the end of the First World War.

Roll of Honour: St. Luke’s Church.

It is our plan to build a biography page for all of these men but it will take some time! The aim is to build up a picture of what happened to these men and their families who survived the Great War. If you have any photographs or biographical information to help us with this project, please contact us, using the link, below.

The names from the two village Rolls of Honour have been collated in to a table at the bottom of this page; as we build these biographical pages, links will appear on the table.

War Memorial: Brass Plaque, St. Luke’s Church.

This memorial was originally sited in the Chapel and was moved in to Church when the Chapel closed.

Note: William Collyer’s name is also missing from this plaque.

Roll of Honour (WWI):

There are two Rolls of Honour recording the names of those from Hickling who served during World War I. The Chapel Roll of Honour includes 57 names whilst the Church Roll of Honour includes 59; some of the name spellings are different across the two lists (both spellings are given, below) and they are listed in a different but, roughly, alphabetical order. William Ward is on the Chapel list but not the Church list; William Collyer, Fred Jackson and James Herbert Ward are on the Church list but not the Chapel list. It may be that the listings for William Ward and James Herbert Ward refer to the same person.

The Church Roll of Honour also includes the regiments for each soldier. In some villages and communities friends and siblings joined up together, served together and were often killed together – in some cases a community lost all of their men in the same campaign, inflicting terrible devastation for those left behind. Unusually, in Hickling men seemed to have joined a wide range of different regiments – in a sense, ‘spreading the risk’. This may explain the relatively low casualty rates experienced in Hickling; of the 59 soldiers listed on the Church Roll of Honour, there are approx. 30 different regiments listed.

It is our plan to build a biography page for each of these men but it will take some time! The aim is to build up a picture of what happened to these men and their families who survived the Great War. If you have any photographs or biographical information to help us with this project, please contact us, using the link, below.

As we build these biographical pages, links will appear on the table.

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