War, sacrifice and gratitude

IT was only a few months ago that we celebrated the 75th anniversary of the end of the Second World War.

After that conflict, as after the Great War, people’s minds turned to commemorating those who had died in battle.

Some churches did it in the same way as before, others thought another sort of memorial might be more appropriate. Most went for monuments or plaques but stained glass was the chosen medium for a number of congregations.

Whatever the memorial, the wording was important. Was it solely for those who had died? Could it be said that they had made the ‘supreme sacrifice’ or was there only one ‘supreme sacrifice’ – that of Christ on the cross? Should the other soldiers who had returned, more or less intact, also be acknowledged? And what about those on the home front, under the threat of the blitz, who had been struggling in one way or another to play their part in the war effort?

At Grangemouth Old (now Zetland) Parish Church all the combatants were acknowledged and the window was dedicated ‘in everlasting remembrance of the men from this church who fell…and with humble thanksgiving for the many that returned’. At Grahamston Parish (now Grahamston United) Church, Falkirk plaques similar to those for the First World War were erected for those who died in the Second but, in addition, a window was installed ‘in thanksgiving for the many who returned from service’.

Blackridge Parish Church had no First World War memorial and so those who died then were commemorated in the same set of windows as their comrades in the Second and all their names are recorded in the stained glass. The inscription refers only to the fallen. However, as well as the names and the main figures of St Andrew and Christ, one hand in blessing and the other holding the cup of salvation, there are smaller scenes.

One shows two soldiers charging with fixed bayonets, with the silhouettes of many more behind them. Two more depict non-combatants – a miner, a quarryman, a ploughman with his team, an engineer and a housewife. They, too, ‘did their bit’, working long hours in difficult circumstances, anxious about their friends and relatives fighting abroad, putting up with rationing and having to ‘make do and mend’.

It is the inscription on the war memorial window at Cadzow Parish Church, Hamilton that is so appropriate: ‘To the glory of God remembering the sacrifice of 1939-1945’.

Everyone made some kind of sacrifice in order to hasten the end of war and usher in a time of peace.

To all of them, some still with us but most long departed, we owe a debt of gratitude.

All the illustrations are taken from the war memorial windows of 1948 by Douglas Hamilton in Blackridge Parish Church, West Lothian. Jeff is a priest in the Church of England, now retired, and has made a particular study of 20th century Scottish stained glass. These photos, along with many more, appear in his recently-published book ‘Orchestrations of colour: the stained glass of Douglas Hamilton’, which retails at £19.95. For further details, please contact coplowpregmail.com

This article appears in the November 2020 Issue of Life and Work

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