“King Edward VII (1841-1910)” by Sir Thomas Brock (Toronto, formerly Delhi)

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King Edward VII (1841-1910).

Sir Thomas Brock, K.C.B., R.A. 1847-1922

Bronze

1921

Toronto, Canada

King Edward VII died in May 1910. A month later the All-India Memorial Committee decided to commemorate his reign with an equestrian statue in Delhi. Thomas Brock was awarded the commission for a fee of £4,200 (4000 guineas).

The statue shows the king on horseback, wearing the full-dress uniform of a field marshal and holding his plumed hat in his left hand so that his face can be clearly seen.[continued below]

text by John Sankey. The image was originally published in the Foundry Trades Journal in 1921.

[ You may use this image without prior permission for any scholarly or educational purpose as long as you (1) credit the photographer and (2) link your document to this URL in a web document or cite it in a print one.]

When it was observed that the king was riding bareheaded under the fierce Indian sun, the All-India Memorial Committee firmly replied: ‘The ruler of the British Empire could properly be shown doing what no other Englishman would do.’

In December 1911 the new king, George V, visited India and laid the foundation stone of the monument to his father. He was presented with a silver model of the proposed statue and this is now in the Royal Collection. Work on the massive bronze statue was interrupted” by the 1914-18 War and it was not completed until 1921, when George V inspected it in the Thames Ditton Foundry. It was then shipped to India and unveiled by the Prince of Wales (later Edward VIII) on 15 February 1922.

When India became independent in 1947, memorials of British rule were put into storage, including Edward VII. Learning of this, a Canadian businessman purchased the statue in 1969 for $10,000 and presented it to the city of Toronto, where it now stands.

Bibliography

Brock, Frederick. Thomas Brock, Forgotten Sculptor of the Victoria Memorial. Authorhouse 2012. pp. 24-27.

Sankey, John. Thomas Brock and the Critics — An Examination of Brock's Place in the New Sculpture Movement. PhD Thesis, University of Leeds, 2002.

Last modified 26 February 2016