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A single firework went off above Cally Pool on Saturday night to mark 12 months to the day from the murder of teenager Alan Cartwright.

More than 100 people gathered by a makeshift memorial in Caledonian Road to the boy known to his family as “Little Al”.

Alan, 15, died from a single stab wound after he and friends were ambushed for their bikes in what the judge called a “senseless and gratuitous piece of violence”.

Joshua Williams will serve at least 21 years in jail after he was found guilty in September last year.

On Saturday, a minute’s silence was observed before a piper played, a nod to Alan’s Scottish heritage.

Earlier that day, his family walked the short distance from the memorial to Thornhill Square, where a cherry blossom tree was planted in his memory.

His father, Alan senior, mother Michelle and grandmother Gillian stood in silence in front of the Cally Pool memorial on Saturday evening.

Also there was little Emily, the sister Alan never got to meet as she was born just weeks after his death.

Alan’s older sister, Cherrie Ives, 22, described how hard it was knowing that Alan and Emily never met.

“It is really odd because obviously her big brother was meant to be here when she was due to be born,” she said.

“She will know about her brother in good time. It is just really strange. She has blue eyes just like him.”

Before friends and family headed to Kennedy’s pub to toast Alan’s memory, Cherrie and friends lit a lantern for Alan. She said: “You expect him to walk in the door or get a phone call.

“I am still coming to terms with that. Now I say: ‘Do you remember when Al did that?’ Talking about him in the past tense is hard.”