Former Mayor’s painting celebrates heroes of the Boer War

A WATERCOLOUR painting of the McCarthy O’Leary statue in Warrington’s Queen’s Gardens has been presented to the chairman of the South Lancashire Regiment Association.

The painting was done by former Mayor of Warrington Geoff Settle and was presented to association chairman Percy Bell at a ceremony at the Picturesq gallery at Latchford.
Geoff had got the idea of doing a painting of the statue after attending the annual wreath laying ceremony in Queen’s Gardens two years ago, when he was Mayor

The ceremony is a tribute to the men who lost their lives at the battle of Pieter’s Hill, led by Col William McCarthy O’Leary, during the Boer War.

The colonel and three of his men were killed at the moment of victory in February 1900.

Regimental memorabilia belonging to the South Lancashire’s is now held in storage in Preston and is rarely seen, so Geoff decided the painting would be better hung at Percy’s home in Cinnamon Brow.

The former Mayor also presented three other paintings to local people.

One was a panting by local artist Sandra Pearson, of the former observation tower at Risley Moss, which was burned down last year.

Geoff presented the picture back to the artist who had loaned it to him as chairman of Warrington Nature Conservation Forum (WNCF).

The other two paintings, both by the former Mayor, were of the Garnett Water Tower in the town centre, which was presented to Warrington-Worldwide editor Gary Skentelbery for his support for the ill-fated campaign to save the tower from demolition, and a charming study of a field mouse, which he presented to myself in recognition of my children’s book, “Jumbles Wood”, which told of animals facing up to developers encroaching on their woodland homes.

This was a theme that Geoff, as chairman of WNCF, emphasised with.