Nelson's Column, Montreal

The Nelson's Column ( Colonne french Nelson) is a monument in Montreal. It stands on the Place Jacques -Cartier and was built in 1809 in memory of the British Admiral Horatio Nelson, over three decades before the more widely known Nelson's Column in London.

The news of the British victory at the Battle of Trafalgar and the simultaneous death of Nelson was announced in Montreal during a dance ball, were present at the numerous businessmen. This at once decided to erect a monument in honor of the admiral and organized a fundraising campaign to finance the construction. The contract for the design of the monument was the London architect Robert Mitchell, but he was inspired by the Trajan column in Rome. The Nelson statue and the ornaments were made ​​in the manufactory Coade and Sealy 's in Lambeth. The column comes from Montreal Maurer Gilmore, who edited the local limestone as specified by the architect.

After the statue and the ornaments had been delivered to Montreal, the monument was completed in 1809. Among the French-Canadian population of the city of Nelson's Column was very controversial, since the conquest of New France lagged only half a century and Nelson had defeated a French fleet. The column was in their eyes a rule symbol of the expanding British Empire. In 1900, we replaced the ornaments from Coade stone by those from natural stone. 1999, a copy of the statue on the column was set, the original has since been exhibited at the Centre d' histoire de Montréal, where it is protected from the weather.

The column is 16.5 meters high and has a diameter of about 1.5 meters, the height of the statue is 2.6 meters. The Nelson's Column is one of the oldest examples of Neoclassical architecture in Canada and the oldest monument in the country.