Oliver Cromwell
Frederick W. Pomeroy, RA
Unveiled, 1901
Bronze and granite
Market Place, St Ives, Huntingdonshire
As the inscription on the base of the statue says, Oliver Cromwell was a townsman of St Ives from 1631-1636. St Ives has a proud history of dissent:” by the time Cromwell was living there, non-conformists were already holding meetings in each other's homes. Notice that Cromwell carries not only a sword but a Bible. Carlyle noted sarcastically in his essay "Hudson's Statue" that the townsfolk had long wanted to honour Cromwell. Attempts had been made to raise funds for such a statue in Huntingdon, Cromwell's birthplace, to mark the 300th anniversary of his birth, but these attempts failed and a statue was then erected at St Ives instead.
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Text and Photograph by Jacqueline Banerjee. 2008.