Nelson's Column

File:William Henry Fox Talbot - The Nelson Column in Trafalgar Sqaure under Construction - Google Art Project.jpg ]]

File:Trafalgar Square-2.jpg, The Palace of Westminster and Westminster Abbey]]

In February 1838, a group of 121 peers, Members of Parliament (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.{{cite web |url=http://www.bonhams.com/eur/auction/17830/lot/35/ |title=Lot No: 35 An important mid 19th century carved bathstone architect's 1:40 scale model of Nelson's column |access-date=30 May 2011}} Several other entrants also submitted schemes for columns. The second prize was won by Edward Hodges Baily who suggested an obelisk surrounded by sculptures.The Civil Engineer and Architect's Journal, Volume 2, 1839

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 Baily. The original plan was for a column {{convert|203|ft|m}} high, including the base and statue, but this was reduced to {{convert|170|ft|m}} with a shaft of {{convert|98|ft|m}} due to concerns over stability.{{cite book |title=Report from the Select Committee on Trafalgar Square |year=1840 |location=London |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=HXFbAAAAQAAJ }} 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 (and son of Nelson's secretary, John Scott), 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".{{cite journal |year=1840 |title=The Nelson Memorial |journal=The Nautical Magazine |volume=9 |pages=887–8 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=s4MEAAAAQAAJ |access-date=14 July 2011 }} 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,Hansards Parliamentary Debates, Vol. CXLIV, p.1220 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.{{cite news |title=The Nelson Column, Trafalgar Square |newspaper=The Times |date=6 December 1849 |page=3}}{{cite news |title=The Nelson Column |newspaper=The Times |date=5 April 1850 |page=5}} 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.{{cite web |url=http://www.npg.org.uk/research/programmes/bronze-sculpture-founders-history.php |title=Bronze sculpture founders: a short history |publisher=National Portrait Gallery |access-date=12 September 2011}} It was finally put in place in May 1854.{{cite book |last=Mace |first=Rodney |title=Trafalgar Square: Emblem of Empire |year=1976 |publisher=Lawrence and Wishart |location=London |page=107}}

File:Admiral Horatio Nelson, Nelson's Column, Trafalgar Square, London.JPG statue by Edward Hodges Baily]]

The {{convert|17|ft}} statue at the top was sculpted by Edward Hodges Baily R.A. from three pieces of Craigleith type sandstone donated by Walter Montagu Douglas Scott, 5th Duke of Buccleuch, former chairman of the Nelson Memorial Committee, from his own quarry at Granton, Edinburgh.{{cite web|url=http://www.grantonhistory.org/industry/granton_quarry.htm|title=Granton Quarry|access-date=30 May 2011|archive-date=6 February 2011|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110206010112/http://www.grantonhistory.org/industry/granton_quarry.htm|url-status=dead}}

The statue stands on a fluted column built from solid blocks of granite from the Foggintor quarries on Dartmoor.{{cite web

| title = Holiday Geology Guides – Trafalgar Square

| publisher = British Geological Survey

| url = http://www.bgs.ac.uk/education/holidayguides/trafalgar.htm

| access-date = 24 May 2009

}} The Corinthian capital is made of bronze elements, cast from cannon salvaged from the wreck of HMS Royal George{{cite news |url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-hampshire-14691988 |title=The wreck that revealed the Mary Rose |publisher=BBC News |date=4 September 2011 |access-date=5 September 2011}} 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 {{convert|900|lb|kg}} are fixed to the column by the means of three large belts of metal lying in grooves in the stone.{{cite book |title=Curiosities of London |last=Timbs |first=John |year=1858 |location=London |page=284 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=8N1JAAAAIAAJ |access-date=27 October 2011}}

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.{{cite news

| url=https://www.theguardian.com/travel/2007/oct/01/rorymaclean.travelbooks

| work=The Guardian

| location=London

| title=London illuminated

| date=1 October 2007

| access-date=20 May 2010

| first=Rory

| last=MacLean}}

The four identical bronze Barbary lions{{cite web |title=The lion: A victim of its own power? |url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-33315873 |publisher=BBC News |date=30 June 2015 |access-date=1 July 2015}} 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.{{cite web |url=http://yourarchives.nationalarchives.gov.uk/index.php?title=Landseer%E2%80%99s_Lions_in_Trafalgar_Square |title=Landseers Lions in Trafalgar Square |access-date=30 May 2011}}{{dead link |date=November 2017 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes}}

{{cite news |title=Origins of Nelson Column |newspaper=The Times |date=22 November 1943 |page=6}}

File:Stone Lion (29530696422).jpg Village]]

Thomas Milnes received the commission in 1858, and produced four full-scale models in sandstone, each individualised to represent Peace, War, Vigilance and Determination. These were rejected, and the commission was transferred, again, to Sir Edwin Landseer. Subsequently mill owner Sir Titus Salt bought the statues instead for a civic building at the centre of his workers village, installed on pedestals in 1869.{{cite web |last1=Banerjee |first1=Jacqueline |title=Comparison of Sir Edwin Landseer's and Thomas Milnes's Lions for the Base of Nelson's Column |url=https://victorianweb.org/sculpture/misc/landseer2.html |website=victorianweb.org |access-date=30 March 2024}} The four sandstone Lions now have Grade II* listed building status.{{cite web |title=Victoria Hall including wall, gate-piers and sculpted lions to front area, and railings to rear, Shipley - 1314205 {{!}} Historic England |url=https://historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1314205 |website=historicengland.org.uk |access-date=9 April 2024}}{{cite web |title=SALTAIRE SCHOOL INCLUDING WALL, GATE PIERS AND SCULPTED LIONS TO FRONT AREA, AND GATE TO SOUTH SIDE, Shipley - 1300666 {{!}} Historic England |url=https://historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1300666 |website=historicengland.org.uk |access-date=9 April 2024}}

File:Bronze lion and church spire, Trafalgar Square - geograph.org.uk - 1600280.jpg at the base]]

The sculptures eventually installed were designed by Sir Edwin Landseer in collaboration with Carlo Marochetti. Landseer was a hugely popular painter and the favourite of Queen Victoria.{{cite web |title=The Desert by Sir Edwin Landseer |url=http://revealinghistories.org.uk/smoking-drinking-and-the-british-sweet-tooth/objects/the-desert.html |website=revealinghistories.org.uk |publisher=Manchester City Galleries}} Their design may have been influenced by Marschalko János's lions at each abutment to the Széchenyi Chain Bridge in Budapest, installed six years before the Trafalgar Square lions were commissioned.

Landseer requested casts of a real lion from Turin which did not arrive until 1860. In the meantime, he made sketches of lions at London Zoo and eventually received the corpse of one to work with. Delays in completing the work meant that the corpse started to decompose, leading to some discrepancies in form. The paws, for example, were based on those of a cat, and the sculpted lion's backs are concave rather than convex.{{cite web |last=Gulliver |first=Beth |title=The gruesome story behind the Trafalgar Square lions you probably don't know |url=https://www.mylondon.news/news/gruesome-story-behind-trafalgar-square-21824427 |website=My London |date=12 October 2021 |access-date=9 April 2024}}

The sculptures were eventually installed in 1867. 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.{{cite web |url=http://telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/howaboutthat/8584165/Ban-tourists-from-Trafalgar-Square-lions-before-they-destroy-them-report-says.html |archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/archive/20220112/http://telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/howaboutthat/8584165/Ban-tourists-from-Trafalgar-Square-lions-before-they-destroy-them-report-says.html |archive-date=12 January 2022 |url-access=subscription |url-status=live|title=Ban tourists from Trafalgar Square lions before they destroy them, report says |date=19 June 2011 |work=Telegraph.co.uk}}{{cbignore}}

The column was renovated and cleaned by sandblasting in 1968.{{cite AV media |type=Newsreel |title=Nelson's Column |url=https://www.britishpathe.com/asset/88851/ |publisher=British Pathé |date=14 April 1968 |access-date=7 May 2023}}

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, in order to minimise any harmful impact on the bronze and stonework.{{citation |title=Project of Nelson's Column Restoration |url=http://www.nelsons-column.co.uk/project.htm |url-status=dead |publisher=David Ball Restoration |access-date=30 September 2008 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080615124630/http://www.nelsons-column.co.uk/project.htm |archive-date=15 June 2008 |df=dmy-all}} 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 {{convert|185|ft|m|1|abbr=on}}. In fact, it measures {{convert|169|ft|m|1|abbr=on}} from the bottom of the first step to the tip of the admiral's hat.

John Noakes of the BBC TV children's programme Blue Peter climbed the column in 1977. Television 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, Wilmot 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 1978 for the Anti-Apartheid Movement, making use of the lightning conductor en route.{{cite news |last=Beresford |first=David |title=Anti-apartheid protestors make first ascent of Nelson's Column |url=https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2016/oct/21/anti-apartheid-protestors-make-first-ascent-of-nelsons-column-1978 |work=The Guardian |date=21 October 2016 |access-date=31 May 2019}} On 30 March 1988, Joe Simpson and John Stevenson climbed the column as part of a Greenpeace Campaign against Acid rain. On 14 June 1992, it was climbed by Martin Cotterrel, Joe Simpson and John Stevenson on behalf of Greenpeace to protest against the first Earth Summit meeting in Brazil. On 13 April 1995, Simon Nadin free-climbed Nelson's Column with Noel Craine, Jerry Moffatt 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 publicize the plight of Canadian Inuit. On 13 May 1998, the Column was climbed by Al Baker, Peter Morris and John Cunningham on behalf of Greenpeace to protest against Old growth logging activity in British Columbia. In May 2003, BASE jumper and stuntman Gary Connery parachuted from the top of the column, in a stunt designed to draw attention to the Chinese policies in Tibet.

In December 2015, Disney paid £24,000 to cover it in lights to make it resemble a giant lightsaber, to promote Star Wars: The Force Awakens.{{cite web|url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/12055403/star-wars-the-force-awakens-Disney-pay-to-turn-Nelsons-Column-into-a-lightsaber.html|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20151217100914/http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/12055403/star-wars-the-force-awakens-Disney-pay-to-turn-Nelsons-Column-into-a-lightsaber.html|url-status=dead|archive-date=17 December 2015|title=Video: 'Star Wars: The Force Awakens': Disney pay £24,000 to turn Nelson's Column into a lightsaber |date=17 December 2015|work=Telegraph.co.uk}}

On 18 April 2016, in the early hours of the morning, Greenpeace activists climbed up the column and placed a breathing mask on Admiral Lord Nelson in protest of air pollution levels.{{cite web|url=https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-36070182|title=Eight arrests after Greenpeace protesters scale London monuments|date=18 April 2016|publisher=BBC News}}

{{Main|Monuments and memorials to Horatio Nelson, 1st Viscount Nelson}}

The first civic monument to be erected in Nelson's honour was the Nelson Monument, a 44-metre high obelisk on Glasgow Green in Glasgow, Scotland, in 1806. Also in Scotland, the foundation stone for Nelson's Tower at Forres in Moray was laid in 1806 and it was completed in 1812;{{cite web|title=Forres, Cluny Hills, Nelson's Monument|url=https://canmore.org.uk/site/15864/forres-cluny-hills-nelsons-monument|work=Canmore|publisher=Historic Environment Scotland|accessdate=2022-04-02}} while the Nelson Monument stands on top of Calton Hill, Edinburgh. 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. 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.{{cite web |last=Burns |first=Patrick |title=BBC site with photograph |url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/herefordandworcester/nature/12.shtml |publisher=BBC |date=30 August 2011 |access-date=5 September 2011}} The Britannia Monument in Great Yarmouth, England (1819), is a 144-foot-high doric column design.

Elsewhere in the world, Nelson's Column in Montreal was erected by both Britons and Canadians 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.[http://www.funbarbados.com/Sights/S_lordnelson.cfm Lord Nelson Statue] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080708224645/http://www.funbarbados.com/Sights/S_lordnelson.CFM |date=8 July 2008}}. FunBarbados.com[http://barbados.org/maps_google.htm?mapPoint=170 Barbados Tourism Encyclopaedia] – Lord Nelson's Bronze Statue[http://www.barbados.gov.bb/placesofInterest.htm The Government of Barbados] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20091113144604/http://www.barbados.gov.bb/placesofInterest.htm |date=13 November 2009}} – Lord Nelson's Bronze Statue

File:Nelson's column - Battle of Cape St Vincent relief (Musgrave Watson).jpg|The Battle of Cape St. Vincent by Musgrave Watson and William F. Woodington, the relief on the west face of the plinth

File:Nelson's column - Battle of the Nile relief (Edward Carew, 1850).jpg|The Battle of the Nile by William F. Woodington, the relief on the north face of the plinth

File:Nelson's column - Battle of Copenhagen relief.jpg|The Battle of Copenhagen by John Ternouth, the relief on the east face of the plinth

File:Nelson's column - Death of Nelson at Trafalgar.JPG|The Death of Nelson at Trafalgar by John Edward Carew, the relief on the south face of the plinth

File:Nelson's Column during the Great Smog of 1952.jpg|The column during the Great Smog of 1952

File:Landseer Lion and Nelson's Column.jpg|One of the Landseer Lions with the column behind, June 2021

• Berlin Victory Column
• Congress Column
• July Column

{{reflist|2}}

{{Commons}}

• [http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/4945380.stm Nelson's broken arm to be X-rayed] – BBC News, 26 April 2006
• [http://www.camvista.com/england/london/trafsq.php3 Web cam of Trafalgar Square including Nelson's Column] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110406094820/http://www.camvista.com/england/london/trafsq.php3 |date=6 April 2011}}
• John Timbs, [http://www.victorianlondon.org/buildings/nelson.htm Curiosities of London], 1867
• [http://www.victorianlondon.org/buildings/nelson.htm Entry] in Victorian London – Buildings, Monuments and Museums

{{Trafalgar Square}}

{{Public art in London|portrait sculpture}}

{{London landmarks}}

{{Edwin Landseer}}

{{Sculptures}}

{{Authority control}}

Category:Columns related to the Napoleonic Wars

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Category:Monuments and memorials to Horatio Nelson

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