When I originally started photographing war graves and monuments it was very much a hit and miss thing. There is no real list of what is out there and often you have to troll through webpages and books in the hope that you may just find something. The World War 1 Memorial in Kingston Frost Park is one of those that I found by looking at my streetfinder with a MK1 eyeball.
There is no real context as to how or why this memorial ended up in Brixton, but the park is a pretty place and I remember as a young boy going along the paths and just enjoying an untouched piece of nature. I don’t recall seeing the memorial though, but maybe I was not really tuned to finding things like that.
What I do not understand is why this memorial always hides behind mad weather? I have been to it three times already and each time have had really odd weather. Between when I left home and when I arrived home on that day I experienced 2 rain showers, overcast skies, clear skies and the odd sky that you can see in the image. The view from up there is stunning too, but the urban forest of Johannesburg hides everything in a field of green.
I then headed “down the road” to where the former Irish Brigades Memorial used to be. I class this memorial as extinct, as it was dismantled and taken to Orania in 2002. All that is left are the foundations, heaps of litter and not much else. It is a pity that they don’t use this site for another memorial, a nice Rand Revolt one would be great seeing as this area was active during the 1922 strike. When I did the original webpage for the memorial in 2007, there was not a lot of information available, but since then an interesting webpage with the history of the Irish Volunteers and the memorial has surfaced and its well worth the read.
All that is left of the original site
I have to admit that I deplore the loss of the memorial, what happened to the grandiose plans that were made for the site where the memorial stood? I also visited the AW Muller stadium where my mapbook said there was a “Freedom Monument” but the security guard said that it too was gone. I headed home via Melville and stopped to grab a quick pic. This is what happens to Beyers Naude Drive…..
That pretty much wrapped up my gallivanting for the week. It had also encompassed Westpark as well as Braamfontein Cemetery, but that is another story for another day.
© DRW 2011-2018. Links fixed and images recreated 20/03/2016