London For Dummies

Striking a Pose: Famous London Statues

Unlike pigeons, people don’t really pay too much attention to statues of public figures anymore. The whole idea of casting a bronze of an important public figure just doesn’t fit with the modern worldview. Who’d qualify for such an honor in this day and age?

In London, the only person today who may be considered deserving of such a monument is the late Princess Diana (at least in the general public’s opinion), but it’s the late Queen Mother who will get the official royal tribute, in the form of a statue placed off the Mall (Diana got a fountain named after her in Hyde Park).

The city is filled with bronze statues commemorating all sorts of individuals from the past. At some point during your London stay, you may run into ten (or so) statues that make you wonder, “Who is that?” The following “Famous London Statues” map shows you the locations of notable statues you're likely to encounter.

Admiral Lord Nelson

In Trafalgar Square (Tube: Charing Cross), perched atop the 145-foot Nelson’s Column, is one of London’s most famous monuments — a statue of (you guessed it) Admiral Lord Nelson. Horatio Viscount Nelson defeated the French and Spanish at the 1805 Battle of Trafalgar and is Britain’s best-known naval hero. On the column, he’s 17 feet high (and had to be hoisted up in three sections), but in real life, he was all of 5’4” tall. (Also in Trafalgar Square, you can see an equestrian statue of George IV, who considered himself a gentleman but was nobody’s idea of a hero.)

Charles I

In 1633, French sculptor Hubert Le Sueur completed the equestrian statue of Charles I that stands (or rather sits) at the north end of Whitehall, just south of Trafalgar Square (Tube: Charing Cross). It comes as little surprise that many royals think of themselves as larger than life. Charlie, who came in at just 5 feet tall, had the sculptor tack another foot onto his frame. In real life, alas, the monarch lost whatever symbolic stature that extra foot gave him when Cromwell chopped off his head in 1649.

However, history has many strange twists and turns: This statue was sold to a scrap dealer who was supposed to destroy it but instead buried the piece in his garden. In 1660, when the monarchy was restored and Charles II ascended the throne, the scrap dealer shrewdly sold the new king the undamaged statue. The figure didn’t go up in its present spot on Whitehall — with a pedestal by great architect Sir Christopher Wren — until 1765.

Duke of York and Edward VII

Just north of St. James’s Park, at the midpoint of Carlton House Terrace (Tube: Charing Cross), you can find the Duke of York Monument. Why did the Duke of York (not Prince Andrew) warrant this massive 7-ton statue? He was the second son of George III (who held the throne when America gained its independence from Britain); when he died, he was massively in debt. Sir Richard Westmacott’s 1834 sculpture, which rests on a column of pink granite, was funded by withholding a day’s pay from every soldier in the Empire. I ask you, was that fair? Some wags have speculated that the duke’s statue was placed high up so his creditors couldn’t reach him.

The monument looms over Waterloo Place, an enclave of aristocratic elegance and one of London’s greatest examples of urban planning. At the entrance of Waterloo Place, you find a statue of Edward VII, chiseled by Sir Bertram Mackennal in 1921 to honor the king who gave his name to the Edwardian Era. The son of Queen Victoria, “Eddie” had to wait until he was 60 before he could ascend the throne, and he died nine years later.

But not all is royal in Waterloo Place: You also find a statue dedicated to the victims of the Crimean War.

Henry VIII

Henry VIII is perhaps England’s best-known king. You may have “seen” him in plays, movies (such as Anne of the Thousand Days and A Man for All Seasons), and that great Masterpiece Theatre TV series, The Six Wives of Henry VIII. Henry VIII was a huge man, with huge appetites, and he wouldn’t take no for an answer. (He didn’t have to — he was king.)

The much-married monarch was never considered anyone’s idea of a role model, so maybe that explains why London has only one statue of him. You can see it atop the Henry VIII Gateway on West Smithfield (Tube: Barbican). In 1702, the stonemasons who built St. Paul’s Cathedral built the gateway, which commemorates Henry giving St. Bartholomew Hospital to the city — a gift made possible by his dissolution of the monasteries.

James II and George Washington

Two notable statues flank the main entrance of the National Gallery, across from Trafalgar Square (Tube: Charing Cross). On the left, you can see British sculptor Grinling Gibbons’s fine statue of James II, from 1636, a year after James ascended the throne. Because he immediately levied new taxes and sought to restore Catholicism to England, this monarch never caught on in the public popularity polls. In fact, he was ousted from the throne and spent the rest of his life in exile in France.

The George Washington statue on the right is a Jean Antoine Houdon replica of a statue in the capitol building in Richmond, Virginia. A gift from that state, the statue arrived in London with boxes of earth for the base, so the first American president would always stand on American soil.

Oliver Cromwell

The small garden in front of the Houses of Parliament (Tube: Westminster) contains a statue of Oliver Cromwell, Lord Protector of England from 1653 to 1658. This fanatical Puritan led the Parliamentary armies during the Civil War that dethroned Charles I. Under Cromwell’s “protectorate,” at least 30,000 Irish men, women, and children were massacred, and vast tracts of Ireland were handed over to the English.

Small wonder that Irish members of Parliament were outraged when Cromwell’s statue, by Hamo Thorneycroft, was unveiled in 1899. In fact, Parliament ultimately refused to pay for it, and Lord Rosebery, the then–prime minister, shelled out the money himself. Cromwell, a sword in one hand and a Bible in the other, appears to be averting his eyes from the bust of Charles I (the king he had beheaded — see “Charles I”), which you can see across the street above the doorway of St. Margaret’s Westminster church.

Peter Pan

Children love the famous statue of Peter Pan, north of the Serpentine Bridge in Kensington Gardens (Tube: Lancaster Gate). Commissioned in 1912 by Peter Pan’s creator, J. M. Barrie, the bronze sculpture by George Frampton marks the spot where Peter Pan touched down in the gardens. Of course, this kid could fly — he didn’t have to take the Tube like the rest of us.

Peter Pan was an adored fantasy hero long before he became the name of a psychological syndrome for men who refuse to grow up. He was to children of earlier generations what Harry Potter is to the kids of today. Maybe someday there’ll be a Harry Potter statue in King’s Cross Station, standing alongside the trolley at Platform 9 3/4.

Prince Albert

Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha (a name that the royals changed to Windsor at the onset of World War I) was the handsome German consort of Queen Victoria. When he died at age 42 in 1861, the grief-stricken queen donned the black widow’s weeds she wore for the rest of her long life.

London has two statues of Prince Albert. You can find one at the rejuvenated Albert Memorial in Kensington Gardens (Tube: Lancaster Gate). The other stands in the center of Holborn Circus (Tube: Chancery Lane). The latter has been dubbed “the politest statue in London” because the prince is raising his hat.

Queen Boudicca

Who, you may wonder, is the superwoman in the horse-drawn chariot at the north end of Westminster Bridge (Tube: Westminster)? She’s Queen Boudicca (or Boadicea), that’s who, with her fearless warrior-daughters at her side. “Bo” was a fierce Celtic queen who fought back the invading Romans and died in a.d. 60. Thomas Hornicraft created the sculpture in the 1850s; the figure was placed at its current site in 1902.

Winston Churchill and Abraham Lincoln

Parliament Square (Tube: Westminster) boasts more outdoor sculptures than any other place in London. Unless you’re a student of British history, most of the bronze gentlemen (Sir Robert Peel, Benjamin Disraeli, the 14th Earl of Derby, and General Jan Smuts) ranged around the square won’t mean anything to you.

But you may recognize two of them. Sir Winston Churchill, the prime minister during World War II, is at his most bulldoggish in Ivor Roberts-Jones’s 1975 sculpture, standing in the square’s northeast corner.

A statue of Abraham Lincoln, by Augustus Saint-Gaudens, stands across the street on the west side of the square. The statue of America’s 16th president was a gift from the city of Chicago, which has the 1887 original in Lincoln Park.

A Glossary of English Food Terms

When you’re in London, you speak English. American English is perfectly fine, of course. Like a major credit card, it’s accepted everywhere. But you may come across a few unfamiliar terms, particularly when you’re talking about food. The following “translations” may help you:

Minding Your Teas and Queues

British English differs a bit from the English spoken in the New World. You may encounter the following “foreign” words and phrases, which are listed with their American English translations: