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They call him the REAR Admiral
Sep 19 2003
By David Bell, Evening Mail
The cheek of it! Bullring developers have put up the statue of Lord Nelson the wrong way round.
The only sight thousands of shoppers are getting of the Rear Admiral is his backside.
"It is an insult to Birmingham and one of the nation's greatest heroes," fumed Coun John Lines.
"This statue was paid for by public subscription and was the first of the hero of Trafalgar to be erected anywhere. Now we have managed to get him on public display again after such a long time in storage, we might have taken the trouble to get him standing the right way round."
Planning chairman Coun Renee Spector confirmed the mistake.
"We wanted Nelson to be facing Selfridges so people entering and leaving the Bullring got a profile view of him," she explained.
"But the way the statue has been erected, you can't really see it properly."
Meanwhile councillors are becoming increasingly anxious that Nelson may become the next target of public art vandals.
The massive bronze bull, the symbol of the Bullring, has already been defaced, and yobs have already been seen scrambling over Nelson's statue which is still without the protection of its traditional railings.
The Birmingham Alliance were under instruction by the council to erect the railings by the end of next month.
An Alliance spokesman explained: "The restoration work to the railings is taking longer than expected.
"The number of visitors to the Bullring is expected to be high, particularly during the run up to Christmas and the January sales, and it would be undesirable to hoard off the monument to carry out works during this period."
Mrs Spector said the railings would be in place by March.
"They can turn Nelson around at the same time," she added.
