Stowmarket Council School Memorial Drinking Fountain

The Recreation Ground, Finborough Road, Stowmarket, Suffolk, IP14 1PN

Listed on the National Heritage List for England. Search over 400,000 listed places

Overview

Drinking Fountain and First World War memorial. Read the official list entry to find out more.

Heritage Category:: Listed Building
Grade:: II
List Entry Number:: 1442348
Date first listed:: 20-Feb-2017
List Entry Name:: Stowmarket Council School Memorial Drinking Fountain
Statutory Address:: The Recreation Ground, Finborough Road, Stowmarket, Suffolk, IP14 1PN

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Official list entry

Heritage Category:: Listed Building
Grade:: II
List Entry Number:: 1442348
Date first listed:: 20-Feb-2017
List Entry Name:: Stowmarket Council School Memorial Drinking Fountain
Statutory Address 1:: The Recreation Ground, Finborough Road, Stowmarket, Suffolk, IP14 1PN

This List entry helps identify the building designated at this address for its special architectural or historic interest.

Unless the List entry states otherwise, it includes both the structure itself and any object or structure fixed to it (whether inside or outside) as well as any object or structure within the curtilage of the building.

For these purposes, to be included within the curtilage of the building, the object or structure must have formed part of the land since before 1st July 1948.

Understanding list entries

Corrections and minor amendments

This List entry helps identify the building designated at this address for its special architectural or historic interest.

For these purposes, to be included within the curtilage of the building, the object or structure must have formed part of the land since before 1st July 1948.

Understanding list entries

Corrections and minor amendments

Location

Statutory Address:: The Recreation Ground, Finborough Road, Stowmarket, Suffolk, IP14 1PN

The building or site itself may lie within the boundary of more than one authority.

County:: Suffolk
District:: Mid Suffolk (District Authority)
Parish:: Stowmarket
National Grid Reference:: TM0441058706

Summary

Drinking Fountain and First World War memorial.

Reasons for Designation

Stowmarket County School Memorial Drinking Fountain, which stands in the Recreation Ground on Finborough Road, is listed at Grade II for the following principal reasons: * Historic interest: as an eloquent witness to the tragic impact of world events on this local community, and the sacrifice it has made in the First World War; * Architectural and design interest: a highly ornamented and well-cast drinking fountain by the Saracen Foundry, incorporating the war memorial dedication, standing at its original location.

History

The aftermath of the First World War saw the biggest single wave of public commemoration ever with tens of thousands of memorials erected across the country. This was the result of both the huge impact on communities of the loss of three quarters of a million British lives, and also the official policy of not repatriating the dead: therefore the memorials provided the main focus of the grief felt at this great loss.

These included memorials raised by corporate bodies and institutions to mark the sacrifice made by their members. One such memorial was raised in the Recreation Ground on Finborough Road, Stowmarket, by Stowmarket Senior Council School as a permanent testament to the sacrifice made by ex-pupils who lost their lives in the First World War. The drinking fountain was put up in the new recreation ground that had been opened on 1 May 1920 by Mr George Ormes, chairman of the Stowmarket Urban District Council’s War Memorial Committee. The fountain was provided by Walter Macfarlane and Co of the Saracen Foundry, Glasgow. The adjacent war memorial gates were unveiled and dedicated on 13 February 1921 by the Lord Lieutenant of Suffolk, Sir T Courtenay Warner.

The fountain stood just inside the War Memorial Gates to the Recreation Ground. It was moved to the western corner of the park to permit access for the Queen’s vehicle through the gates, when she visited Stowmarket in 1961. In 2007 the fountain was restored and returned to its original location.

Walter Macfarlane and Co Ltd, based at the Saracen Foundry, Glasgow, was active from 1868 to 1951. The firm cast a large range of sanitary, architectural, and artistic products. The foundry's work includes a great number of listed structures, such as a Sewer Ventilation Pipe in Bideford, the fountain in Princess Gardens, Torquay, a public urinal on Front Street, Castleford (all Grade II-listed), and numerous Grade II-listed telephone kiosks across the country.

Details

The cast drinking fountain is large and highly ornamental, standing inside the War Memorial Gates to the Recreation Ground on Finborough Road. It takes the form of four bowls supported by a central pedestal with four lions one to each side. Scenes cast in relief decorate the pedestal and exterior surfaces of the bowls, including ponds with water-lilies and other plants. The bowl interiors are scalloped. From the intersection of the bowls a tapering pedestal rises to support an urn. The urn used to have four arms from which chains and drinking cups were suspended; the chains and cups, and two of the arms, are now missing.

Each face of this pedestal is ornamented with cast decoration including strips of foliage to each arris, scrolls and shells from which the water issued in each lower section, and depictions of swans and a heron in the upper sections of three of the sides. On the fourth side the dedicatory inscription reads: THIS DRINKING FOUNTAIN/ WAS PRESENTED/ TO THE TOWN OF/ STOWMARKET/ BY THE CHILDREN OF THE/ ADJACENT SENIOR COUNCIL/ SCHOOL IN MEMORY OF/ THOSE OLD SCHOLARS/ WHO MADE THE/ SUPREME SACRIFICE/ IN THE GREAT WAR/ 1914-18.

This List entry has been amended to add the source for War Memorials Online. This source was not used in the compilation of this List entry but is added here as a guide for further reading, 6 March 2017.

Sources

Websites
War Memorials Online, accessed 6 March 2017 from https://www.warmemorialsonline.org.uk/memorial/156303
War Memorials Register, accessed 6 December 2016 from http://www.iwm.org.uk/memorials/item/memorial/4849
Other
'Walter Macfarlane & Co.', Mapping the Practice and Profession of Sculpture in Britain and Ireland 1851-1951, University of Glasgow History of Art and HATII, online database 2011 [http://sculpture.gla.ac.uk/view/organization.php?id=msib6_1219334887, accessed 16 January 2017]

Legal

This building is listed under the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990 as amended for its special architectural or historic interest.