Six Memorials to local poets

Philip James Bailey (1816-1902)
by Albert Toft, bronze bust and bronze panel on granite plinth, 1901

Thomas Miller (1807-1874)
by Ernest George Gillick, bronze bas relief on stone tablet, 1901

William (1879) and Mary Howitt (1799-1888)
by George Frampton, bronze bas relief on granite plinth, 1901

Lord Byron (1788-1824)
by Alfred Drury, bronze bust on granite plinth, 1904

Henry Kirke White (1785-1806)
by Oliver Sheppard, bronze bust and bronze panel on granite plinth, 1902

Robert Millhouse (1788-1839)
by Ernest George Gillick, bronze bas relief on stone tablet, 1904

These six memorials to Nottinghamshire figures were erected as directed by the William Stephenson Holbrook (1826-1900) Secretary at the castle at the time of its refurbishment (by T.C. Hine) and its museum. A colonnade was added to the castle's west façade, under which are arranged the sculptures.

The Holbrook Bequest was established for the 'cultural advantage of the city' and for the relief of the poor. Monuments were to be erected to famous local poets, and also to mark spots in Nottingham where interesting historical events occurred.

Perhaps the most affecting of the Castle sculptures is the scene of William and Mary Howitt, who published many poems, translations and popular histories whilst living in Nottingham, and were eventually awarded Civil List pensions. Kirke White was a Nottingham lawyer remembered for the hymn 'Oft in Danger, Oft in Woe'; Millhouse was a weaver and poet; Lord Byron was buried at Hucknall (where his cement niche statue, 1903, overlooks the market place).

Below Philip James Bailey's bust is a bronze relief illustrating a passage in Festus, his own apparantly unreadable version of Goethe's Faust. Thomas Miller published several novels, poems and children's books, and was awarded a pension by Disraeli; the memorial does not have his image, but instead features two female allegories crouched on each side of a simple inscription.