WORK looks set to start on a memorial for Stacksteads soldiers who lost their lives in World War One.

It has taken almost two years to raise the £10,000 needed to build the monument and create a new entrance for the town's Peace Gardens, formerly known as the Blind Gardens. The final £3,000 is expected to come from Rossendale Council and work is due to start this month.

This will include demolishing a bus shelter at Toll Bar, in Newchurch Road, new railings, rebuilding a wall and planting shrubs.

The Peace Garden was originally created for ex-soldiers, many of them injured or blind.

The project has been led by Stacksteads ward councillor, Michael McShea, who has secured the funding needed for the work, and local historian Phil Broadhurst, who has researched the names of local men who died in battle.

Phil developed an interest in locals who fought in the war after visiting the Somme and Ypres.

He has now carried out painstaking research to discover the names of 120 soldiers from Stacksteads who have never featured on a memorial in this country. Those are the names that will appear on the new monument.

Coun McShea said: "We are just waiting for the final piece of funding to be approved by Rossendale Council and I am confident that that money will be found.

"It is nice that things are finally coming together. The work should be finished in plenty of time for this year's service of remembrance."

He said: "The original idea came from Phil .

"He kept coming across names in the army records where there was no record of them locally and no monument to their sacrifice.

"We now have 120 names of men who are not recognised on any cenotaph and this monument will be our acknowledgement that they made the ultimate sacrifice and it will give the town a place to lay its wreaths on Remembrance Day."