Finding John Bunyan

Throughout our trip, we had been on the lookout for a statue of John Bunyan but had been unable to locate one. Bunyan (1628-1688), a Baptist forefather, is one of Bill's heroes for his stand on individual freedom as well as for the impact of Pilgrim's Progress on his (Bill's) thinking as a young seminarian introduced to the work for the first time, and the influence the book continued to have throughout his years as a pastor in the local church.  

Robert did a Google search and found that the major statue of Bunyan is in Bedford, near his birth place at Elstow and the crossroads where he first began to preach. He is buried in London, in the cemetery of Bunhill Fields, in the Burrough of Islington, north of the City of London, next to 3 other historically famous nonconformists: George Fox (1624-1691), Daniel Defoe (1659-1731), and William Blake (1757-1827). Both locations were too far away to visit in the time allotted. However, we discovered that there was a rather impressive statue located back over near Bloomsbury Church in the Holborn area, where Bunyan actually died, and we set out to find it.

Bunyan became ill in 1628, after he had ridden out from Bedford to London to mediate a conflict between a father and son over an inheritance issue. He found himself too weak to return home, and took refuge with a friend named John Strudwick, who lived in Holborn. He died there at Strudwick's house, away from his wife and family.

The statue is in a niche on the front of the old headquarters of the Baptist Union, built in 1901. The headquarters has since relocated to Oxfordshire and the building is no longer in use.

John Bunyan, holding a copy of Pilgrim's Progress. The sculptor is Richard Garbe, a late 20th century artist influenced by the Victorian and Edwardian eras. The work is dated 1953, but it is thought that this may be an error, and instead should be 1903, as the sculpture resembles the artist's earlier works that are more decidedly Victorian than his later work that were art deco. In addition, the sculpture is located near two others of Edward I and Edward VII, both done by Garbe in his early years and similar in style.

The opening lines of Pilgrim's Progress are printed below the statue