Great Railway Journeys: Statues and Monuments by Roger Mason
I have written four books for Amberley in the Great Railway Journeys series and there are two more in the pipeline. They are not technical tomes about such things as signals and points, rather they are about fascinating things that can be seen from the windows of trains when making the journeys.
Statues and monuments are in all of them and seven feature below. Space and possibly readers’ boredom thresholds could be limiting factors and so much more could have been put in. I have favoured stories and interest over such things as detailed specifications.
The first three monuments and statues appear in my latest book Great Railway Journeys: London to Oxford and London to Cambridge. The remainder are included in my earlier books, London to Birmingham, London to Sheffield, and the Chiltern Line to Birmingham.
The Eleanor Cross at Waltham Cross
The Eleanor Cross is magnificent and extremely well preserved. What is more, it is very old and commemorates a fascinating and touching story. Eleanor married the future Edward I when she was just thirteen. He was three years older and became King in 1274 when he was thirty-seven. It was a very happy marriage and they were a devoted couple. Edward was devastated when she died at the age of forty-nine.
Part of Eleanor’s body was buried at Westminster Abbey and Edward arranged for monuments to be erected at each of the twelve places where her remains rested overnight on their journey to get there. The monument at Waltham Cross is one of just three that remain. The final one at Charing Cross has been replaced and there are just fragments of the eight others.
The Jubilee Clock Tower in Maidenhead
The Jubilee Clock Tower is situated just eighty yards from Maidenhead Station. It is forty-six feet tall and a visually pleasing structure with four identical clock faces. There are Gothic and baroque flourishes, and also ornamental merlons and turrets with tracery.
The Jubilee Clock Tower was erected to celebrate the Diamond Jubilee of Queen Victoria. It was completed in 1899 but her sixtieth anniversary was in 1897. The delay was understandable. It would have been a major embarrassment if her Majesty had died after completion but before the date of the anniversary.
Statue of Edward VII in Reading
The Edward VII statue is located immediately outside the main entrance to Reading Station and it was erected to commemorate the King’s coronation on 9 August 1902. It is a notable landmark and was financed by a private citizen in honour of his late father who had lived all of his eight-eight years in the town.
It is a fine statue with a good likeness, but very kind to its subject. It shows him as a slim and good-looking man, which was far from the truth. He was a glutton and seriously overweight. He was, though, a popular king. Edward was a heavy smoker and this together with his weight may well have contributed to his death eight years later at the age of sixty-eight. His three successors (George V, Edward VIII and George VI) were also smokers and this may have contributed to their deaths too.
The Burdett-Coutts Memorial Sundial
This is not far from St Pancras Station in St Pancras Old Churchyard. It is a tall structure built in the Gothic style. When the railway was built, they removed the graves and gravestones. The obelisk commemorates the people whose last resting place was disturbed.
Angela Burdett-Coutts commissioned and paid for the sundial that bears her name. She was a fabulously wealthy philanthropist and apart from Queen Victoria she was the wealthiest woman in Britain.
Angela formed a close friendship with the Duke of Wellington and proposed marriage to him. At the time she was thirty-three and he was seventy-eight. He turned her down in a charming way. Much later at the age of sixty-seven she married a man of twenty-nine.
Statue of a Victorian Railway Navvy
This delightful bronze statue is situated on a platform at Gerrards Cross Station. Navvies were remarkable men who built the railways, and some years earlier had built the canals. The expression ‘navvy’ is an abbreviation of the word navigator. The sculptor was Anthony Stones.
The Coombe Hill Monument
Coombe Hill is 852 feet above sea level and can be seen from the Princess Risborough area. The tall monument on the top commemorates the 143 men of Buckinghamshire who died fighting for queen and country (or king and country) in the Second Boer War of 1899-1902. The plaque on the monument calls it the South African War.
It in no way diminishes the sacrifice and patriotism of those who died but it is worth mentioning that the war was controversial. Many foreigners thought that Britain’s cause was unjust and quite a few Britons felt the same. Lloyd George said that it was like Britain fighting Caernarvonshire, which was the county in which he lived. The war was going badly for Britain at the time and he added that it looked as though Caernarvonshire was winning.
The Bridgewater Monument
The Bridgewater Monument is high up and close to Tring Station. It is 108 feet tall and made of Aberdeen granite blocks on a plinth of York stone. The vase at the top is made of copper on a framework of wrought iron. There are 170 steps up to the viewing platform round the vase.
The inscription on the base reads ‘In honour of Francis, Third Duke of Bridgewater, “Father of Inland Navigation, 1832.’ The duke ordered and financed the construction of a pioneering canal from his coal mines at Worsley to the industrial city of Manchester. When it was completed in 1761 the price of coal in Manchester immediately dropped from 7 pence per ton to 31/2 pence per ton.”
I have picked only seven of the statues and monuments that feature in the Great Railway Journeys book series to talk about in this blog. Depending on the location the books also contain fascinating stories and tales of royalty, famous people, poetry, architecture, flora and fauna to name a few things. They also include, one of my favourite pastimes, locations where one can enjoy a lovely cup of tea and cake.
Great Railway Journeys series by Roger Mason is available for purchase now.
