This Churchill statue business looks like getting serious, and those
who have views on statues must not keep them all for the represen- tation of President Roosevelt in Grosvenor Square. I had myself taken vague notice of the proposal to put up some vast statue of the British war leader on the cliffs of Dover, but the pictures and letterpress in Tuesday's News Chronicle appal me. An American business man named Mr. Charles H. Davis proposes, it seems, to raise L250,000 or more to erect a 76-ft. statue of Mr. Churchill on a 6o-ft. tower, the figure being replete with the inevitable cigar, whose lighted tip would constitute a perpetual beacon visible from Calais or farther. The base of the tower is square, and rejoices in a bull-dog, modelled to the general scale, on guard at each corner. The intention, of course, is admirable—no appreciation of Mr. Churchill's services during the war could well be too high—but the conception is intolerable. No one, fortunately, is free to drop monstrosities on our shores, and I don't suppose there is any real danger of this one reaching this side of the Atlantic at all, but it seems quite time for some one responsible to thank Mr. Charles H. Davis very much and ask him to think again.
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