With the centenary of World War I being commemorated next year, Marlborough Town Council is now to call in the only known specialist cenotaph cleaning company to renovate the war memorial at the New Road/London Road roundabout.
This follows the rejection by the Heritage Lottery Fund to help pay for renovation because the joint Town Council/British Legion project doesn’t qualify under any of its accepted criteria.
The cleaning is estimated cost of £1,675, councillors have been told in a report from town clerk Shelley Parker.
“The company uses a super heated hot water system that does not damage the stone,” she says. “It would include a copper stain remover and cleaning would include the plaque and work to the enamelled lettering.”
With the memorial’s plinth is also in need of refurbishing, a local firm of stonemasons involved in building the original plinth is to be asked to give the council a quote.
And the council decided by one vote for its grounds team to repaint the chain posts surrounding the 7th Wilts Regiment memorial at the London/Salisbury road junction.
The total cost of all three projects is estimated at £3,125, which will have to come out of the contingency budget of the council’s Finance and Policy Committee or from the council’s own reserves.
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