[Retlaw]

Originally Posted by Margaret Pilkington

And if you notice, they are cutting down two majestic mature trees and the replacing them with others....oh and a statue of a dog(?)...it is the Pals dog so maybe that makes it alright.

There is just one thing wrong Margaret, first of all we must define the Accrington Pals, those from Burnley & Chorley would not even under torture admit to being an Accrington Pal, Burnley would only refer to them selves as Z company, Chorley as Chorley Coy of the 11th East Lancs, they had a dog as a mascot.
Back to the Accrington Pals, they had a mascot, it was a big Tom Cat, and when they left Acc for Caernarvon, Albert Sant had it draped round his neck.
If all this hoorah is about the Accrington Pals, then let's keep it to the Accrington Pals. let Burnley & Chorley do their own thing.
Besides which Accrington had the biggest casualty rate .
Out of the total Casualties for the 11th East Lancs that day.
720 men went over the top 196 of those casualties were Accrington Men, Church, Clayton, Gt Harwood, Rishton & Ossy also had Casualties total for all them was 131.
What riles me about all this hoorah about the Accrington Pals is
how many so called ex spurts have come out of the woodwork since Bill Turner died, most of them have done no more than read his books, and then quote and use passages as if they were their own.

In 2006 Bill and I did the Pals 90th Aniversary at the Haworth, no long winded committee meetings, we just got our stuff together and trimmed a few walls up wi pictures & other info on the PALS, and from feed back it was an eye opener for all, & we had no complaints