World War 1
The Great War of 1914-18 saw a large numbers of Chertsey’s men go off to the conflict. 
The town itself had one very frightening incident when on a hot August night in 1915 a Zeppelin raider was seen motionless over the station area for an hour around midnight. Gunfire was heard.
The log book of the giant German airship was lost in the Allied bombing of Germany in WW2 so we will never know why the Zeppelin
crew found Chertsey so attractive. Perhaps it was the gasworks.
Sir Charles Blane, Baronet, from a local military and naval family and Commander 
of the Battle Cruiser ‘The Queen Mary’, went down with his ship after it blew apart in half from salvos of 12 inch shells from the German Battle Cruiser SMS Seydlitz at 4.26pm in the opening stages of the Battle of Jutland on 31st May 1916. 
He and his two brothers names are recorded on the carved and gilded war memorial in the chapel of St. Peter’s Church Chertsey along with others of the town’s fallen.
Blane mountain in Alberta, Canada, was named after him in 1921.
Other mountains of the same range were named after various other Great War heroes. Like many towns Chertsey was different after The Great War. The names of 130 the local fallen of that conflict are inscribed without rank, regiment, or service, on the public granite and bronze War Memorial designed by London sculptor Joseph Whitehead. The considerable numbers of wounded and severely wounded Chertsey men are not known. The cost of the memorial was £2000 by public subscription and shows a life size figure of a British ‘Tommy’ stepping out of the mud of Flanders in a motion of greeting.
The Chertsey War Memorial was dedicated with great ceremony led by the Bishop of Guildford on the afternoon of Sunday 30th October 1921 to the largest crowd of people ever seen pressed into the centre of Chertsey. They heard in silence local man Lt’ Colonel Clare D.S.O.& M.C. who lived at Abbey Chase address them without the aid of microphones. The plinth was draped in large Union Flags. After the unveiling the granite steps and plinth was smothered with flowers and greenery from the crowd. The identical bronze British Tommy by the same sculptor can be seen on at least three other war memorials throughout the country, including Truro in Cornwall.