The National Police Memorial is a memorial in central London, commemorating about 4,000 police officers killed in the course of their duties in the United Kingdom. It was designed by Lord Foster of Thames Bank and Per Arnoldi and unveiled in 2005. The project architect for Foster was Peter Ridley.
Historical background
In 1984, following the shooting of Yvonne Fletcher, film director Michael Winner founded the Police Memorial Trust. Initially the trust concentrated on erecting smaller monuments at the points where officers had died on duty. From the mid-1990s, the trust also lobbied and raised funds for a single, larger scale memorial to commemorate all police officers who had died in the course of their duties. Winner stated that "Memorials to soldiers, sailors and airmen are commonplace, but the police fight a war with no beginning and no end".
Winner donated £500,000 of his own money to the campaign for a national memorial.
The remainder of the total cost of £2.3million was met by a public collection.
Design and construction
The memorial was built to a design by Lord Foster of Thames Bank and Danish designer Per Arnoldi, on the corner of The Mall and Horse Guards Road, directly outside the Old Admiralty Building. The site was occupied at the time by an air shaft on the Bakerloo line of the London Underground. A guard of honour was provided by 56 officers wearing the uniforms of each of the UK's police forces.
Despite concerns over the potential cost, construction of the memorial eventually came in at £400,000 under budget, in part because a number of the contractors concerned carried out their work free of charge.
The memorial was a winner of the Royal Institute of British Architects award for 2006.
Architectural elements
left|thumb|Repair work on the airshaft in 2007
The memorial consists of two distinct architectural elements, linked by a terrace of Purbeck stone.
Immediately north of the block, a glass column is sited in a reflecting pool. The column is internally illuminated by fibre optic cables with a faint blue light, symbolising the blue lamp which traditionally hangs outside police stations in the United Kingdom. The book is compiled from the approximately 4,000 names recorded by the Police Roll of Honour Trust, listing all officers who have died in the line of duty. also that, with the book being behind glass, friends and relatives of the deceased are not able to view the relevant page. Concern was also raised by some Irish republicans that the memorial includes the names of those RUC officers killed in The Troubles.
References
External links
- The National Police Memorial
- Image gallery at Foster & Partners