This week sees the two hundredth anniversary of the abolition of the slave trade. One of the leading abolitionists, William Wilberforce, has been celebrated in the feature film Amazing Grace. In Hull, the city Wilberforce represented as a Member of Parliament, there will be lectures from the Anglican Archbishops of York and Canterbury and the Wilberforce museum is to be reopened after a £1.6 million refurbishment programme.

The Wilberforce Monument from Queens Gardens

For architects and sculptors it is interesting to reflect on how Wilberforce's contempries chose to celebrate the man. When Wilberforce died in 1833, £1,250 raised by public subscription to erect a permanent memorial in his home town. The foundation stone was laid on 1 August 1834, the same day that "Negro Slavery" was officially abolished in the Empire.

The form and scale of the monument are both remarkable. From a great cube, bearing wreathed inscriptions on four faces and decorated with acroteria and urns, a colossal Greek Doric column rises to over 100 feet (30 meters), where it is topped by a statue of Wilberforce himself. There are many monumental columns around the world, most are in the Roman Doric of Corinthian orders; I can not think of another example in the Greek Doric order. According to the official website, the base is derived from sarcophagi in the Pero-Lachaise Cemetery in Paris and the whole monument represents the Christian triumph over death. Nikolaus Pevsner identifies the architect (and presumably sculptor) of the monument as John Clarke of Leeds. Through the telephoto lens the statue looks like a charicature (and is lent no dignity by the lightening conductor emerging from the top of its head!) but this is of course not how the statue is meant to be viewed. From the ground the silhouette of Wilberforce is an easy recognisable element of the city sky line.

The original location of the Wilberforce Monument

The original location of the monument was close to, what became, Victoria Square; by 1935 it was considered a traffic hazard and was moved to its present location on the axis of Queen's Gardens. The commanding effect the monument had in this position was diminished by the construction of Hull College in 1960-62: the nine storey block by Sir Frederick Gibberd is not the most inspired work of the architect who also designed Liverpool's Catholic Cathedral and seems to peer over Wilberforce's shoulder when seen from the gardens. The college has recently adopted the monument as its logo.

The monument has been lightly cleaned and flood lighting installed for this years celebrations. Sand stones often react badly to aggressive cleaning leaving the monument in a slightly blackened seems wise.

Nikolaus Pevsner & David Neave (1995) , Yorkshire: York and the East Riding, The Buildings of England, ISBN 0-300-09593-7.