THIS Saturday marks the 100th anniversary of the opening of the Gallipoli Campaign, Winston Churchill’s ill-conceived and poorly executed plan to open up a sea route into the Black Sea and establish a southern supply line to the Russian Empire; an ally of Britain and France during the First World War.

In the eight and a half months of the disastrous campaign it is estimated more than 100 men from our town fought at Gallipoli, with 15 being killed in action or dying of wounds or illness, representing around 7 per cent of all those from the borough that died during the Great War.

There will be national commemorations for the Gallipoli Campaign in London on Saturday, however, those not able to get to the capital may want to detour to the Garden of Remembrance at St Mary’s this weekend and pause for a moment at our cenotaph to reflect on the names of the 15 men that did not return to Andover from the Dardanelles a century ago; Reginald Alexander, Harold Beckingham, Harry Blackburn, John Chalk, Walter Chittenden, George Cook, Edward Coster, William Creed, Gilbert Gamman, Ernest Hoare, Edwin Hutchence, Francis Lee, Charles Pickett, Herbert Smith and Edwin White. We will remember them.

Craig Fisher, of Berry Way, Andover