City wartime memorial could get permanent home

A sculpture memorialising a key part of Hereford’s wartime history could be about to get a permanent home.

The two-metre-high “Rotherwas Angel” would occupy a grassy corner where trees have already been planted, between Skylon View and Beech Lane, Rotherwas, the city’s main area for new industry, if planning permission is granted.

The sculpture was originally commissioned in 2019 by Hereford City Council and created by Hereford College of Arts students, as a memorial to the workers of ROF (Royal Ordnance Factory) Rotherwas.

It stood for a year a the city’s skate park, but although it was then donated to the community history group Rotherwas Together, Covid held up its relocation, according to group secretary Nicola Goodwin.

If permitted, the statue would stand on 1.2-metre-high recycled concrete blocks, while an accompanying panel would explain about the former ROF.

“We hope that the sculpture will provide a focal point for people walking and cycling through Rotherwas, and boost people’s awareness of and pride in where they live and work,” Ms Goodwin said.

Rotherwas Together volunteers also plan to run awareness events and to create a walking route map and information leaflet to encourage people to visit it.

In her day job with BBC Hereford and Worcester, Ms Goodwin earlier led a campaign to have munitions workers, who at the peak of the Second World War numbered over 4,000 woman and nearly a thousand men at Rotherwas, recognised for their role in the Allied victory.

As a result, surviving munitions workers have for the past seven years taken their place in the Remembrance Day parade at the Cenotaph in London.

Comments on the planning application, numbered 232839, can be made until December 4.

The group is also using government funding to create a searchable archive of Rotherwas’ wartime workers, some of whom relocated to the city from as far afield as Scotland.