A Valentine's Series postcard which was posted in Brockley on the 23rd. June 1913 to:
Madame Ch. Bonnerot,
139, Avenue d'Allemagne,
Paris 19ème,
France.
The name Avenue d'Allemagne was soon to disappear. On the 31st. July 1914, Jean Jaurès, French politician and philosopher who was strongly opposed to pushing for war, was assassinated in Paris.
To celebrate his memory, on the 19th. August 1914 the name of the avenue was changed to Avenue Jean Jarès.
On the 3rd. August 1914, Germany had declared war on France, and so the change of name was also a political act.
Cleopatra's Needle and the Sphinxes
Cleopatra's Needle (out of shot, to the right) is flanked by two faux-Egyptian sphinxes, designed by the English architect George John Vulliamy.
The sphinxes are cast in bronze, and bear hieroglyphic inscriptions that say "The good god, Thuthmosis III given life".
The sphinxes appear to be looking at the Needle rather than guarding it, due to the sphinxes' improper or backwards installation. The Embankment has other Egyptian flourishes, such as buxom winged sphinxes on the armrests of benches.
On the 4th. September 1917, during the Great War, a bomb from a German air raid landed near the needle. In commemoration of this event, the damage remains unrepaired to this day, and is clearly visible in the form of shrapnel holes and gouges on the right-hand sphinx. Restoration work was carried out in 2005.
Cleopatra's Needle is one of a pair of obelisks that were moved from the ruins of the Caesareum of Alexandria, in Egypt, in the 19th century. It was presented to the United Kingdom in 1819 by the ruler of Egypt and Sudan Muhammad Ali, in commemoration of the victories of Lord Nelson at the Battle of the Nile and Sir Ralph Abercromby at the Battle of Alexandria in 1801.
Although the British government welcomed the gesture, it declined to pay to move the obelisk to London.
The obelisk remained in Alexandria until 1877 when Sir William James Erasmus Wilson, a distinguished anatomist and dermatologist, sponsored its transportation to London from Alexandria at a cost of some £10,000 (equivalent to over £1,000,000 in 2020).
it was dug out of the sand in which it had been buried for nearly 2,000 years, and was encased in a great iron cylinder, 92 feet (28 metres) long and 16 feet (4.9 metres) in diameter. It was built at the Thames Iron Works, shipped to Alexandria in separate pieces, and built around the obelisk.
The cylinder, named the Cleopatra, had a vertical stem and stern, a rudder, two bilge keels, a mast for balancing sails, and a deck house. It acted as a floating pontoon which was to be towed to London by the ship Olga.
The effort almost met with disaster on the 14th. October 1877, in a storm in the Bay of Biscay, when Cleopatra began wildly rolling, and became uncontrollable. The Olga sent out a rescue boat with six volunteers, but the boat capsized, and all six crew were lost – they are named on a bronze plaque attached to the foot of the needle's mounting stone.
Captain Booth of the Olga eventually managed to get his ship next to Cleopatra and rescued the six men on board it. Booth reported the Cleopatra "abandoned and sinking", but she stayed afloat, drifting in the Bay, until found four days later by Spanish trawler boats.
Cleopatra was then rescued by the Glasgow steamer Fitzmaurice and taken to Ferrol in Spain for repairs. The Master of the Fitzmaurice lodged a salvage claim of £5,000 which had to be settled before departure from Ferrol, but it was negotiated down and settled for £2,000.
The paddle tug Anglia, under the command of Captain David Glue, was then commissioned to tow the Cleopatra back to the Thames. Upon their arrival in the estuary on the 21st. January 1878, the school children of Gravesend were given the day off.
A wooden model of the obelisk had previously been placed outside the Houses of Parliament, but the location had been rejected, so the London needle was finally erected on the Victoria Embankment on the 12th. September 1878.
