Liverpool Pals

The City has been experiencing giant fever for the last few days as the street theatre group, Royal de Luxe, returned to Liverpool with their giants. They were here last time for the Titanic memorial weekend, and this time headlined the World War 1 commemorations. Grandma Giant joined Little Girl Giant and her dog Xolo as they toured the city evoking memories of the build up and longevity of the Great War.

We went on Sunday to the finale as the two giant humans were placed on a barge and sailed out of the City from the Albert dock. On their final parade through the centre, the giants were joined by actors dressed as the Liverpool Pals, and WW1 officers in a tribute to the hundreds of locally recruited soldiers who lost their lives in the regular hand to hand conflicts of the war.

The Pals were groups of friends, co-workers and factory owners who were galvanised into action by Lord Derby. He wanted the City to answer the call from Lord Kitchener, that 'Your Country Needs You'. Within weeks of the announcement of war, Lord Derby, put forward the idea of a battalion drawn from the Liverpool business workforce, and even wrote to employers asking that they encourage their employees to enlist. So many turned up that in the end four battalions were formed. These troops were officially the 17th, 18th, 19th and 20th Service Battalions of the King’s, but known as the 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 4th  Pals.

Other cities followed Liverpool's lead and Pals regiments became widespread. By April 1915 the Pals had been formed in to the 89th Infantry Brigade and on 31 October, 1915, it was announced that the Pals would be leaving for France and in a letter to his brother Lord Derby gave his view on how the war could be won, “This war is only going to come to an end by killing Germans, and I am perfectly certain that at that game, the 89th Brigade will more than hold their own.”

The Pals would go on to fight in some of the most costly battles of World War I, taking part in the ‘big push’ at the Somme in 1916.
Almost 200 Liverpool Pals were killed going ‘over the top’ on 1 July, 1916, over 300 more were wounded, captured or recorded as missing.
Of the four original Pals Battalions who sailed to France in November 1915, twenty per cent would be dead by 1919, if the figures of wounded and those transferred to other units are included the casualty figure is closer to seventy five per cent.

The effect of these losses on Liverpool was highlighted on Sunday by a guard of honour of widowed mothers and sweethearts dressed in black,  who lined the procession route.

That Liverpool, and the rest of the Country can find ways of keeping these sacrifices in the minds of our people is a credit to them. Over 1 million people took to the streets in the last four days, many of them young children and teenagers, many with parents and grandparents. The storytelling will continue and with it the pass down of memories and understanding.  It was  heart warming to be part of it.