Nelson's Column is a monument in Trafalgar Square in central London built
to commemorate Admiral Horatio Nelson, who died at the Battle of Trafalgar in
1805. The monument was constructed between 1840 and 1843 to a design by
William Railton at a cost of £47,000. It is a column of the Corinthian order
built from Dartmoor granite. The Craigleith sandstone statue of Nelson is
by E. H. Baily and the four bronze lions on the base, added in 1867, were
designed by Sir Edwin Landseer. The pedestal is decorated with four
bronze relief panels, each 18 feet square, cast from captured French guns.
They depict the Battle of Cape St Vincent, the Battle of the Nile, the
Battle of Copenhagen and the Death of Nelson at Trafalgar. The sculptors were
Musgrave Watson, William F. Woodington, John Ternouth and John Edward Carew
respectively. It was refurbished in 2006 at a cost of
£420,000, at which time it was surveyed and found to be 14 ft 6 in shorter than
previously supposed. The whole monument is 169 ft 3 in tall from the bottom of
the pedestal to the top of Nelson's hat. Construction and history
In February 1838 a group of 121 peers, MPs and other gentry formed a committee
to raise a monument to Lord Nelson, funded by public subscription, and the
Government agreed to provide a site in Trafalgar Square, in front of the newly
completed National Gallery. A competition was held for designs with an
estimated budget of between £20,000 and £30,000. The deadline for submissions
was 31 January 1839. The winning entry, chosen by the
sub-committee headed by the Duke of Wellington was a design by William
Railton for a Corinthian column, surmounted by a statue of Nelson, and
flanked by four sculpted lions. Flights of steps would lead up between the lions
to the pedestal of the column. Several other entrants also submitted schemes
for columns. The second prize was won by Edward Hodges Baily who suggested an
obelisk surrounded by sculptures. Criticism of the organisation of the
competition caused it to be re-run. Railton submitted a slightly revised
design, and was once again declared the winner, with the stipulation that the
statue of Nelson should be made by EH Baily. The original plan was for a
column 203 feet high, including the base and statue, but this was reduced to 170
feet with a shaft of 98 feet due to concerns over stability. The base was to
have been of granite and the shaft of Craigleith sandstone, but before
construction began it was decided that the shaft should also be of granite.
Excavations for the brick foundations had begun by July 1840. On 30 September
1840, the first stone of the column was laid by Charles Davison Scott, honorary
secretary of the committee, at a ceremony conducted, according to the
Nautical Magazine, "in a private manner, owing to the noblemen and gentlemen
comprising the committee being absent from town". Construction of the
monument, by the contractors Grissell and Peto, progressed slowly, and the
stonework, ready for the installation of the statue, was not completed until
November 1843. In 1844 the Nelson Memorial Committee
ran out of money, having only raised £20,485 in public subscriptions, and the
Government, in the form of the Office of Woods and Forests took over the project.
Installation of the bronze reliefs on the pedestal did not begin until late
1849, when John Edward Carew's depiction of the death of Nelson was put in place
on the side facing Whitehall. This was followed early the next year by William
F. Woodington's relief of the Battle of the Nile on the opposite side. Carew's
relief was cast by Adams, Christie and Co. of Rotherhithe. The other three
were cast by Moore, Fressange and Moore. The last to be made, The Battle of Cape
St Vincent became the subject of legal action, when it was discovered that the
bronze had been adulterated with iron. The partners in the company were jailed
for fraud and the relief was completed by Robinson and Cottam. It was finally
put in place in May 1854. The 5.5-metre statue at the top was
sculpted by Edward Hodges Baily R.A. from three pieces of Craigleith
sandstone donated by the Duke of Buccleuch, former chairman of the Nelson
Memorial Committee, from his own quarries.
The statue stands on a fluted column built from solid blocks of granite from
the Foggintor quarries on Dartmoor. The Corinthian capital is made of bronze
elements, cast from cannon salvaged from the wreck of HMS Royal George at the
Woolwich Arsenal foundry. It is based on the Temple of Mars Ultor in Rome, and
was modelled by C.H. Smith.. The bronze pieces, some weighing as much as 900
pounds are fixed to the column by the means of three large belts of metal
lying in grooves in the stone. The four identical bronze Barbary Lions
at the column's base were not added until 1867. At one stage, they were
intended to be of granite, and the sculptor John Graham Lough was chosen to
carve them. However, in 1846, after consultations with Railton, he turned
down the commission, unwilling to work under the restrictions imposed by the
architect. The sculptures eventually installed, commissioned in 1858, were
designed by Sir Edwin Landseer in collaboration with Baron Marochetti.
Their design may have been influenced by Marschalko János's lions at each
abutment to the Széchenyi Lánchíd in Budapest, installed 6 years before the
Trafalgar Square lions were commissioned. Landseer was paid £6,000
for his services, and Marochetti £11,000. In 2011, consultants for the
Greater London Authority reported that tourists climbing onto the backs of the
lions have caused considerable damage and recommended banning tourists from
climbing them. The column also had a symbolic
importance to Adolf Hitler. If Hitler's plan to invade Britain, Operation Sea
Lion, had been successful, he planned to move it to Berlin.
Refurbishment The column was refurbished in 2006,
during which time it was scaffolded from top to bottom for access. Steam cleaning
was used together with gentle abrasives to minimise any harmful impact on the
bronze and stonework. The £420,000 cost was covered by Zurich Financial
Services, which advertised on the scaffolding for the duration of the
work. Before restoration began, laser surveys were taken during which it was
found that the column was significantly shorter than the usually quoted 185
feet. In fact, it measures 169 feet from the bottom of the first step to the tip
of the admiral's hat. Climbs
John Noakes of the BBC TV children's programme Blue Peter climbed the column
in the late 1970s. TV presenter and entertainer Gary Wilmot climbed the
column in 1989 for LWT's 'Six O' Clock Show' to recreate the 'topping out'
ceremony of 1843. Dressed in Victorian attire and sporting a boater hat,
Wilmott enjoyed tea and sandwiches at the top of the column before climbing
down. The column has also been climbed on
several occasions as a publicity stunt to draw attention to social or political
causes. Ed Drummond made the first such climb in 1979 for the Anti-Apartheid
Movement, making use of the lightning conductor en route. On 13 April 1995,
Simon Nadin free-climbed Nelson's Column with Noel Craine, Jerry Moffat and
Johnny Dawes following on top rope, and graded the climb as "E6 6b/5a". This
protest time was on behalf of Survival International to publicise the plight of
Canada's Inuit people. In May 2003, BASE jumper and stuntman Gary Connery
parachuted from the top of the column, in a stunt organised by Isabel Losada,
to draw attention to the Chinese policies in Tibet.
Other monuments to Nelson The first civic monument to be erected
in Nelson's honour was a 44-metre high obelisk on Glasgow Green in Glasgow,
Scotland, in 1806. Also in Scotland, the Nelson Monument stands on top of Calton
Hill, Edinburgh, and there is also a Nelson's Tower in Forres, Moray which
opened in 1812. In Dublin, Ireland, Nelson's Pillar was erected in 1808 but
was destroyed by republicans in 1966, and in the Bull Ring, Birmingham,
England, there is a Grade II* listed bronze statue of Nelson by Richard
Westmacott, dating from 1809. Sir Richard Westmacott also designed the
elaborate monument to Nelson in Liverpool. In Portsmouth, Nelson's
Needle, on top of Portsdown Hill, was paid for by the company of HMS Victory
after arriving back in Portsmouth. There is a column topped with a decorative urn
in the Castle Green, Hereford – a statue was planned in place of the urn, but
insufficient money was raised. The Britannia Monument, Great Yarmouth,
England is a 144 feet high doric column design.
Elsewhere in the world, Nelson's Column in Montreal was erected by both British
and French citizens in 1809, and there is also a Mount Nelson, near Invermere,
British Columbia. As at London, the column in Montreal has the admiral
standing with his back to the waves. A much shorter statue of Lord Nelson in
Trafalgar Square, Bridgetown, Barbados is older than its counterpart in London.
Gallery References
External links Nelson's broken arm to be X-rayed – From
BBC News, 26 April 2006 Web cam of Trafalgar Square including
Nelson's Column John Timbs, Curiosities of London, 1867
Entry in Victorian London – Buildings, Monuments and Museums