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Trafalgar Square Fountains
Trafalgar Square is a square in central London that commemorates the Battle of Trafalgar (1805), a British naval victory of the Napoleonic Wars. The original name was to have been "King William the Fourth's Square", but George Ledwell Taylor suggested the name "Trafalgar Square".
The area had been the site of the King's Mews since the time of Edward I. In the 1820s the Prince Regent engaged the landscape architect John Nash to redevelop the area. Nash cleared the square as part of his Charing Cross Improvement Scheme. The present architecture of the square is due to Sir Charles Barry and was completed in 1845.
The square consists of a large central area surrounded by roadways on three sides, and stairs leading to the National Gallery on the other. The roads which cross the square form part of the busy A4 road, and prior to 2003, the square was surrounded by a one-way traffic system on all sides. Underpasses attached to Charing Cross tube station still allow pedestrians to avoid traffic. Recent works have reduced the width of the roads and closed the northern side of the square to traffic.
Nelson's Column is in the centre of the square, surrounded by fountains and four huge bronze lions sculpted by Sir Edwin Landseer; the metal used is said to have been recycled from the cannon of the French fleet. The column is topped by a statue of Lord Nelson, the admiral who commanded the British Fleet at Trafalgar.
On the north side of the square is the National Gallery and to its east the St Martin's-in-the-Fields church. The square adjoins The Mall via Admiralty Arch to the southwest. To the south is Whitehall, to the east Strand and South Africa House, to the north Charing Cross Road and on the west side is Canada House.
At the corners of the square are four plinths; the two northern ones were intended to be used for equestrian statues, and thus are wider than the two southern. Three of them hold statues: George IV (northeast, 1840s), Henry Havelock (southeast, 1861, by William Behnes), and Sir Charles James Napier (southwest, 1855). Mayor of London Ken Livingstone controversially expressed a desire to see the two generals replaced with statues that "ordinary Londoners would know". [1]
In 1888 the statue of General Charles George Gordon was erected. In 1943 the statue was removed and, in 1953, re-sited on the Victoria Embankment.
The two fountains by Sir Charles Barry that were part of the original plan for Trafalgar Square were
subsequently replaced and, after the Second World War, presented to Ottawa.
These fountains played in Trafalgar Square, London England from 1845 to 1939 when they were removed to make way for larger fountains.
These fountains were brought to the attention of the the National Art Collection Fund of Britain who acquired them for presentation to a Dominion Capital.
Canada accepted the gift and one of the fountains serves as a memorial to Lieutenant Colonel John By, founder of Bytown which was later renamed Ottawa.
The mate to the Ottawa Fountain is located in Wascana Centre on the east side of the Legislative Building in Regina.
Plaque Inscription
"This fountain hounours the establishment of the headquarters
of the North-West Mounted Police
at Regina in 1882, and the officers and members who contributed
to the orderly settlement of the western plains.
Dedicated in the presence of
The Right Hon. Viscount Amory of Tiverton, G.C.M.G.
British High Commissioner to Canada
on August 2, 1963
Presented by the National Gallery of Canada
Erected by the Wascana Centre Authority"
The new, larger basins of Portland stone commemorate two First World naval men, Admiral Beatty and Admiral Jellicoe. They were designed in 1939 by the architect Sir Edwin Lutyens, who had blue tiles placed on the base to give light and colour to the water. Seventy-five years earlier, Lutyens' godfather, the artist Sir Edwin Landseer, had been responsible for the four bronze lions that guard Nelson's Column. The fountain on the west side was sculpted by Sir Charles Wheeler, and that nearest the Strand by William MacMillan, whose bust of Admiral Beatty is on the nearby wall
 
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Colours
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Portland (P)
A natural buff colour |
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White (W)
A crisp Marble white |
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Green (G)
A medium olive green |
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Terracotta (T)
Pale and sun baked |
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Dark Terracotta (DTC)
An earthy Tuscan shade |
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Slate Grey (SG)
A cool dark grey |
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| Colours may vary
slightly due to digital processing |
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