Postman's Park
This quiet park is known as Postman’s Park because
it is so close to the General Post Office. Postal workers
came here to eat lunch after it opened in 1880, as one of
the City’s largest parks.
It was formed from the churchyards of two churches which have now been lost, St Leonard’s Foster Lane, Christ Church Newgate Street, together with that of St Botolph without Aldersgate, the brick church which stands in the Park itself.
Among the ideas for social reform of the Victorian artist G F Watts, who also famously campaigned against the corset, was that of a national memorial dedicated to men and women who had performed heroic, though often futile, acts of self-sacrifice. Unable to stir up official support for his idea he financed it himself in 1900.
Watts planned 120 memorial tablets, but when the memorial opened only four were in place, designed by William de Morgan. Another nine tablets were added before Watts’ death in 1904. His wife carried on the project, adding a further 35 tablets, mostly made by Royal Doulton. She also installed the wooden memorial to her husband carved by TH Wren, one of her students.
Interest then declined in the project and few further tablets were added, and none at all after 1931. In June 2009 a single new tablet was added by the Diocese of London
Watts, who was born in 1817 in Marylebone, was an innovative painter in Victorian times, associated with the Symbolist movement.
In terms of sculpture, his huge bronze statue Physical Energy can be seen in Kensington Gardens. Other works can be seen at the Guildhall Art Gallery and the V&A. He was also appreciated as a portrait painter, and many of his works are in the National Portrait Gallery.
Watts’ first wife was actress Ellen Terry, whom he married when he was 47 and she was 16. Unsurprisingly the marriage was short-lived and Watts did not marry again until he was 69. This time his wife was the 36-year-old potter Mary Seton Watts.
She established the Watts Gallery in Compton in Surrey; the only purpose-built gallery in the country dedicated to single artist, where she also set up a pottery. Her work here was one of the reasons she was unable to continue with the “Wall of Heroes” in Postman’s Park. She also needed to dedicate some time to the Watts Mortuary Chapel, which she had designed and where both their bodies now lie.