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Description: | The range of buildings between the South Castle and God's House Tower had been abandoned as a prison in 1854-5 on the building of a new gaol in Ascupart Street. The South Castle remained vacant until the gatehouse and gallery were requisitioned in 1875-6 for permanent storage accommodation, desperately needed in the fast-growing town, for the Harbour Board and other tenants. The groundfloor of the gatehouse was reserved as the town mortuary. The buildings were cleaned and the south and east fronts carefully restored. God's House Tower was left largely untouched.
Partially obscured on the right-hand side is the almost derelict terra cotta statue of Prince Albert. Its sad history is documented by A G K Leonard, The saga of the Prince Consort's statue, Journal of the Southampton Local History Forum, No. 4, Spring 1993, p. 17-21. Presented to the town by Frederick Perkins in 1877, it was removed, possibly in December 1907, on the visit to Southampton of Kaiser William II, the Consort's grandson, lest its dilapidated state should offend. Put into storage on West Quay, it was destroyed in a show of patriotism by a party of Royal Engineers during the First World War. Our postcard is postmarked 26 September 1917 (sent to a Sapper in the Royal Engineers in France), by which time the statue had long gone. | Format: | image/jpeg | License: | http://www.sopse.org.uk/ixbin/hixclient.exe?a=query&p=gateway&f=generic_sitetext%2ehtm&_IXFIRST_=1&_IXMAXHITS_=1&cms_con_core_subtype%3acms_con_text_what=copyright&%3acms_sys_group=%22sopse%22 | Subjects: | sculpture God's House Tower statue South Gate old prison mortuary Prince Albert Kaiser William II Prince Consort South Castle gaol Southampton Harbour Board | Temporal: | start=1900-01-01; end=1907-12-31; | Source: | Sense of place SE | Creator: | James Valentine and Sons Ltd | Identifier: | http://www.sopse.org.uk/ixbin/hixclient.... | Language: | en-GB | Format: | image/jpeg | Go to resource |
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