Nelson's Pillar - Criticism

Criticism

The building of Nelson's Pillar had been, from the outset, controversial. As early as September 1809 a paragraph appeared in Watty Cox's Irish Magazine, stating: "The statue of Nelson records the glory of a mistress and the transformation of our state into a discount office". Until 1922 most of the criticisms were due to aesthetic considerations or because it was considered an impediment to traffic. In May 1876 a letter to the editor expressed its author's feelings in verse:

In 1876 Dublin Corporation took up the question of removal, but found it did not have the power to remove it. In 1879 the Corporation argued that it should be removed as it was "an ugly traffic hazard". It tried again in 1891, causing much debate in the city and in Parliament, but did not succeed due to financial considerations. A writer on Dublin's history in 1909, Dillon Cosgrave, acknowledged the temporary nature of the Pillar, remarking that "For a very long time, the project of removing the Pillar, which many condemn as an obstruction to traffic, has been mooted, but it has never taken definite shape".

In 1923, the debate was renewed when famous Irish poet William Butler Yeats called for the pillar to be removed on aesthetic grounds, saying "It's not a beautiful object". The debate was renewed again in 1926 and again in 1928. Several attempts were made subsequently to have it removed, including by Taoiseach Seán Lemass, in 1960. He said " has no place in the centre of our capital city overshadowing our principal national monument, which is the GPO". There were proposals to keep the pillar but to replace the statue of Nelson with other statues.

On 7 April 1954, the Dublin Brigade Irish Republican Army (IRA) sent a letter to Dublin Corporation, asking that it "seek legislation for the removal of the Nelson Pillar".

Politician and former SIPTU president Des Geraghty argued that, by the 1960s, "not many people wanted Nelson there...he was a relic of the Empire". Independent Dublin TD Frank Sherwin said: "Although I view Nelson as a great Englishman ... I hold that there should be a great historic Irishman put in his place".