The Cooma Cenotaph stands on the corner of Massie and Vale Streets in Cooma, opposite the post office. The memorial is enclosed by a modern iron palisade fence.
The cenotaph is in the common form of a granite obelisk with a honed finish, mounted on a granite plinth. The plinth is plainly decorated on all four sides, with small pediment shaped faces surmounted by small four-leafed rosettes carved in recessed relief. The dead are listed above the faces. Inscribed on the southern face are the names of the 53 men who fell in the First World War. On the western face are the names of the 30 men from the district who fell in the Second World War.
The foundation stone of the cenotaph was laid on 25 April 1917 and the obelisk installed on 22 April 1924. The unveiling of the engraved names took place on 26 April 1926.
The final cost of the memorial was £1,050, which originally left no money to inscribe the names from the First World War. These names were not inscribed until 1987, along with those from the Second World War.
Directly behind the cenotaph stands the Ernest Albert Corey Memorial Plaque and Diorama, which celebrates Corporal Ernest Corey. Corporal Corey died in Cooma in 1972. In a separate fenced area nearby is the Monaghan Hayes Place memorial, which commemorates the first soldier from the area to die in the First World War. To one side is the Flight Lieutenant Pat Hughes D.F.C. Memorial, dedicated to a Second World War air ace who was killed while shooting down a German bomber.