Esk War Memorial

About

It is an opulent monument of bronze and marble, standing on a sandstone base with corner buttresses which form a cross, and in turn on terrazzo steps. On the base are fixed bronze plates bearing the names of the 83 local men who fell in World War I. The square monument above has a structure of art bronze, with ionic pilasters at the corners and an ionic entablature. Fixed on recessed marble panels are huge bronze plates bearing the names of the 462 others who enlisted from the Shire to serve in World War I, making a massive total of 545 names so recorded. At the top of each of these huge bronze plates are bronze shields bearing elegantly stylised letters AIF (Australian Imperial Force). Additional Information This stone was laid by Colonel A Graham Butler DSO on November 30 1920 in honour of those who paid the supreme sacrifice. Mason was F Williams and Co, Ipswich. In Queensland's Centenary Year, 1959, a table in Memorial Park was donated by Esk RSSAILA for public use. Esk Memorial Park was proclaimed a reserve for memorial purposes in 1979, but a First World War memorial has stood on the site, at the intersection of Highland and Ipswich Streets, since 1921. The memorial was commissioned by the Esk Patriotic Committee on behalf of the shire of Esk. Subscriptions commenced in 1916, and tenders were called in April 1919 by prominent Ipswich architect George Brockwell Gill. The foundation stone was laid on 30 November 1920, and the memorial was unveiled in 1921, probably in September. The masonry work was carried out by the Ipswich firm of Frank Williams & Co., and the art metalwork was supplied by Wunderlich Ltd of Sydney. It cost 885. This was not the first war memorial in the shire. Colinton had erected an honour board at the local School of Arts building in 1916, and a stone memorial in 1917. The Toogoolawah War Memorial had been unveiled in March 1917. In 1983 the memorial park was extended, and a stone memorial to Captain Patrick Logan, commandant of the Moreton Bay Penal Settlement who was murdered while exploring the Brisbane Valley in 1830, was erected in the park in 1984. The site was landscaped in 1985. In 1988 some of the lettering on the First World War memorial was restored, and two plaques commemorating Australian sacrifice in post-1945 conflicts were affixed. In 1991 another plaque was attached, honouring those who fell in the Second World War. (Some of the information sourced from the Queensland Cultural Heritage Register)