MORE than 1,000 children showed their support for equality with a ‘respect march’.

Pupils of Chepstow School were joined by youngsters from local primary schools who will make the move to secondary education in September.

The march came at the end of a fortnight of ‘transition’ activities for 145 primary school children.

It included a celebration at the old Wye Bridge which celebrates its 200th anniversary on Sunday, July 24.

The theme for the transition activities was ‘Stand by Me’ and students made pledge hearts and equality banners and wrote down messages of respect which were carried on a march around the school field.

The LGBT+ group (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender) set up a stall selling t-shirts and rainbow laces to raise money for LGBT fiction for the school library, as well as handing out leaflets of information regarding LGBT rights.

They also sold rainbow fruit kebabs and oversaw an ‘LGBT ally’ photobooth.

The school’s head of sixth form, Mel Thomas, said: “A choir sang Stand by Me at the end, and 1,000 pupils lay down their pledges – a fantastic visual to represent our loving and accepting school community.”

As well as the equality activities, pupils also celebrated the anniversary of the old Wye Bridge with a musical tribute as they walked between Wales and England.

The grade one listed cast iron Chepstow Bridge over the River Wye was built by engineer John Urpeth Rastrick in 1816 and for many years was a crucial connection between Wales and the West Country until the Severn Bridge was opened in 1966. 

Very few five arch road bridges were constructed before 1830 and only the one at Chepstow survives.

A bi-centenary ceremony will close Chepstow’s annual month –long festival on Sunday, July 24 and will be organised by Chepstow Town Council in partnership with Monmouthshire County Council and the Chepstow Festival.

It will be a re-enactment of the original opening, attended by Monmouthshire’s Chairman, Councillor Jim Higginson, his opposite number from Gloucestershire, Colin Hay, the President of the Institution of Civil Engineers, Sir John Armitt CBE and the Mayor of Chepstow, Paul Pavia.

A parade will set off from Beaufort Square at 1pm and the county chairmen will deliver speeches from the centre of the bridge 200 years to the minute that it was officially opened by magistrates in 1816.

Wye Bridge expert John Burrows will give a talk on the significance of the crossing at the Drill Hall in Lower Church Street on Monday (July 18) at 7.30pm.