Guest blogger, Robert Bruce, went on an apposite walk on Sunday.
“Yesterday, in need of exercise on a bright Spring day, I walked down to the Italian Gardens at the north side of Kensington Gardens. I made sure that I was socially distancing all the way. Though this was relatively easy. Not many people about.
I went to that part of the gardens to go and see an important person in these difficult and dangerous times. I went to see Jenner.
He was, as you probably remember, the man who discovered how immunisation worked and opened up the possibilities and astonishing benefits of vaccines. And, yesterday as you can see, he was an exemplar of social distancing.
I had hoped he might provide some advice, or pointers, as to where we are with the coronavirus. Sadly he remained statue like in his silence. But if you look closely he appears to have a rolled up document under his arm. Could this be his considered opinions and advice on what we should do next? His latest work? Maybe a report detailing strategies and actions to bring these infections to an end? I hope so.”
What he is holding in his hand looks very like a very early example of loo roll. I think we can hold him responsible for encouraging the global hoarding that is going on in the face of the pandemic.
Dr Edward Jenner’s statue by Calder Marshall was to be unveiled by Prince Albert in Trafalgar Square but it appears he was not in the end able to do so and the statue stood in Trafalgar Square for only a few years before it was removed to Kensington Gardens after Albert’s death. Punch produced the following:
“England, ingratitude still blots
The escutcheon of the brave and free;
I saved you many million spots,
And now you grudge one spot to me.”
It was replaced by statues of Nelson, Napier and Havelock but Jenner is commemorated elsewhere round the world by various memorials in England, by the names of villages in Pennsylvania, a statue in the Tokyo National Museum and in the memorial east window of St Mary’s Church, Berkeley, Gloucestershire where he lived and practised as a doctor. Next door is Berkeley castle where the unfortunate King Edward II met his untimely end in 1327.