Welcome to Baines Wartime Project
The ‘Family of Baines’ like any other family supported its sons. So when they went to war the School was right behind them. When Christmas came along the Boy’s, parents and staff clubbed together to buy their warriors a Christmas present and a card. The result of this was the boy concerned wrote bacjk telling everyone at home how the war was going for them. When home on leave the boy’s would pop in or write to let the ‘family’ know. This resulted in a social history like few others.
The School magazine, the Poultonian regularly published news from the front; we therefore have a history of Baines at War.
In 1920 the school purchased a war memorial for those Boys that did not return. This was unique in that it listed all those boys that died in the war whether in battle or not. Toen memorials do not do yjis they only list those that died in conflict. In the Second World War a second memorial was unveiled in the school.
This section of the website will give a story of all those boys that died, were wounded, were prisoners and survived both the wars. It will give a back story as we know it together with information from the letters that have survived from the boys to the school. This will be the largest social history project undertaken of the school and will be an ongoing project.
Acknowledgement
Writing a document like this could not have ben possible without a great deal of research. I therefore would like to thank Baines School and Baines FPA for access to the Baines Archive and the School Magazine, the Poultonian.
I also would like to than the British Military for all their help. All materials used in the document were either free from copyright or where copyright was listed, permission was sought.
Click below for the sections
War Poultonians - Poultonian-Vol-XIII-No.-6-December-1946.pdf