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by Keyan Melanian

A restored Second World War destroyer
showed it still had some fighting spirit by beating two other
projects to a National Lottery award.

HMS Cavalier, docked at Chatham’s
Historic Dockyard, made it through to the finals of The National
Lottery Awards 2010 broadcast on BBC1 on Saturday from the
Roundhouse in Chalk Farm, London.

It was one of only three projects to
make it through to the awards’ Best Education Project category and
picked up a £2,000 cash prize.

It beat Chances for Life, a scheme
based in York which supports young people facing homelessness and
other related problems, and Stepney Bank Stables, from Newcastle,
to the award

The ship was the Royal Navy’s last
operational Second World War destroyer and until 1999, was rotting
in a dry dock on Tyneside.

The ship was acquired for preservation
and display at The Historic Dockyard, Chatham as the National
Destroyer Memorial, dedicated to the 143 British Destroyers and
11,000 sailors lost at sea during the war.

Now restored, HMS Cavalier is a major
heritage attraction and the focus of a range of educational
programmes aimed at engaging children and young people.

Since the Lottery began in 1994, more
than £24 billion has been raised for Good Causes by Lottery players
and more than 340,000 grants have been made across the UK

For more information on the Awards or
Lottery-funded projects log on to http://www.lotterygoodcauses.org.uk/