Heroes of Postman's Park ― Heroic Self-sacrifice in Victorian London

The Watts Memorial to Heroic Self-Sacrifice in Postman's Park, London, is a Victorian monument containing 54 ceramic plaques commemorating 62 individuals, each of whom lost their own life while attempting to save another. Every plaque tells a tragic and moving story, but the short narratives do little more than whet the appetite and stimulate the imagination about the lives and deaths of these brave characters. Based upon extensive historical research, this book will, for the first time, provide a full and engaging account of the dramatic circumstances behind each of the incidents, and reveal the vibrant and colorful lives led by those who tragically died.

Dr. John Price is a historian and part-time lecturer in modern British social and cultural history at Goldsmiths University. He is the author ofEveryday Heroism: Victorian Constructions of the Heroic Civilian and Postman’s Park: G.F.Watts’s Memorial to Heroic Self-Sacrifice. He is also a research fellow at the University of Roehampton.