The former King's Head, Church Street, is undergoing a full refurbishment by national pub chain JD Wetherspoon and will be reopened as the Wallace Hartley later this year.

The estimated date for completion is November 17th and the scheme is expected to create 35 jobs and bring £1.2 million of investment into the town.

Wallace Hartley was the bandmaster on the ill-fated Titanic, which sank on its maiden voyage in 1912.

He and the rest of the band were deemed heroes for playing on to keep passengers calm as they boarded the lifeboats.

He perished on the foundering of the ship but his body recovered and buried in Colne, when 30,000 people turned out to pay their last respects.

The naming of the pub joins the statue in Albert Road and the Millennium mural in Parliament Street in featuring the local hero.

The King's Head closed as a pub in the 1990s and reopened as the Original Greek Restaurant. It later became Olives, until it closed in 2006.

JD Wetherspoon was given planning approval just over a year ago for work on the building to begin and was given the go-ahead in September to create a beer garden.