The Warwick War Memorial was constructed in 1923 and the gates were completed one year later in 1924. It is thought to be designed by Roy and Hugh Campbell and executed by Frank Williams. The memorial honours the 122 local men who fell during the
First World War and the gates honour the 377 who served and returned. The memorial is situated on the south-eastern corner of Leslie Park, which has been a recreational square and park for the town since the first surveys in the late 1840s. The same designer and contractor were responsible for the Memorial Gates, which were erected one year later in 1924. Since then other war memorials have been added to Leslie Park, adjacent to the gates, flanking the principal memorial; these include two cairns, one commemorating the
Second World War and the other for various wars including those in
Vietnam,
Korea,
Borneo and
Malaya; as well as two war guns. As well, various buildings have been added to the park including a lawn bowls club and green, a kindergarten and playground and various council administration and storage buildings. Australia, and Queensland in particular, had few civic monuments before the First World War. The memorials erected in its wake became our first national monuments, recording the devastating impact of the war on a young nation. Australia lost 60,000 from a population of about 4 million, representing one in five of those who served. No previous or subsequent war has made such an impact on the nation. Even before the end of the war, memorials became a spontaneous and highly visible expression of national grief. To those who erected them, they were as sacred as grave sites, substitute graves for the Australians whose bodies lay in battlefield cemeteries in Europe and the Middle East. British policy decreed that the Empire war dead were to be buried where they fell. The word "cenotaph", commonly applied to war memorials at the time, literally means "empty tomb". Australian war memorials are distinctive in that they commemorate not only the dead. Australians were proud that their first great national army, unlike other belligerent armies, was composed entirely of volunteers, men worthy of honour whether or not they made the supreme sacrifice. Many memorials honour all who served from a locality, not just the dead, providing valuable evidence of community involvement in the war. Such evidence is not readily obtainable from military records, or from state or national listings, where names are categorised alphabetically or by military unit. Australian war memorials are also valuable evidence of imperial and national loyalties, at the time, not seen as conflicting; the skills of local stonemasons, metalworkers and architects; and of popular taste. In Queensland, the soldier statue was the popular choice of memorial, whereas the obelisk predominated in the southern states, possibly a reflection of Queensland's larger working-class population and a lesser involvement of architects. Many of the First World War monuments have been updated to record local involvement in later conflicts, and some have fallen victim to unsympathetic re-location and repair. == Description ==