LEST WE FORGET: War and Peace in 100 British Monuments

From Boadicea to Basra, the history and achievements of our island nation can be seen all around us in public monuments, and in this inspiring book Tess Dunlop explains the background to 100 notable examples, with fascinating and moving insights into the individuals who are commemorated. The monuments are arranged chronologically, but long-ago events often receive their moment of recognition in much later times. Britian's patron saint St George, a Roman soldier who died in 303 AD, is commemorated as a triumphant horseman in Hyde Park's Cavalry of the Empire Memorial of 1924. The Black Prince in Leeds City Square is another impressive 20th century equestrian statue, representing Prince Edward of Woodstock who led the charge at Poitiers, becoming the epitome of chivalry before he died in 1376. Fast-forwarding to the Napoleonic Wars, the Battle of Waterloo of 1815 was immediately commemorated by a really useful monument, Waterloo Bridge, already under construction as the "Strand Toll Bridge" and hastily repurposed. Hit by a German bomb, it was rebuilt by women in World War II and reopened in 1945. In the mid-19th century Jamaican nurse Mary Seacole found herself barred from serving with the British expedition in the Crimean War because of her colour, so she funded herself and is now an international hero, commemorated near St Thomas's Hospital in a statue of 2016. Nurse Edith Cavell, captured and executed in 1915, is remembered in London's St Martin's Place. Many Indian soldiers recruited to fight in World War have their resting place in the Muslim Burial Ground Peace Garden of 1917 in Woking, while Hindus and Sikhs are memorialized in Brighton. Nelson, Wellington, Churchill, Monty, Turing, the Kindertransport children, Violet Szabo, the Bevin Boys, and War Horses are among the many other memorials. Particularly moving is the section on Tombs of the Unknown Soldier, in which the author speaks to the relatives of the soldiers in modern wars whose bodies were never recovered. 372pp, line drawings.