Scott memorial plaque, Warkworth

A memorial to the Antarctic explorer Captain Robert Falcon Scott and his comrades was unveiled at the Warkworth School in Percy Street on 17 December 1914.

This was a rectangular marble tablet inscribed as follows:

“This tablet / was erected by the residents of / Warkworth / in memory of / Capt. Scott / and his brave comrades / who perished on their return from the South Pole / 25^th March 1912. / ‘They, being dead – yet speak’”.

The plaque went with the school when it moved to a new site in Hill Street in 1946. However, in February 1996 the school’s then headmaster Don Sinclair transferred the plaque to Warkworth Museum.

Sources: ‘Warkworth School Committee’, Rodney and Otamatea Times, 12/8/1914, p. 5; ‘Local and General’, Rodney and Otamatea Times, 16/12/1914, p. 4; Judy Waters, Warkworth Museum, pers. comm., 21/1/2015.