This British Monument CELEBRATES the AMERICAN REVOLUTION

Added: 2026-05-22

[00:00:00]In the grounds of a former aristocratic estate in Leeds stands a triumphal arch.

[00:00:07]It's very unusual.

[00:00:09]It doesn't celebrate a British victory, rather the opposite.

[00:00:14]It celebrates the American Revolution.

[00:00:18]Get a bit closer and you see that it reads Liberty in North America [music] triumphant.

[00:00:24]This is the only British monument to celebrate the American Revolution.

[00:00:29]Why would an 18th century British aristocrat [music] build something like this?

[00:00:35]And what does it tell us about the complex attitude of Britons towards the American Revolution?

[00:00:48]Obviously, I would love to show you the arch in person, but unfortunately, it is privately owned and we were unable to obtain filming permission.

[00:00:56]Nevertheless, the arch was commissioned by Sir Thomas Gascoigne and construction started in 1781.

[00:01:04]To understand why he wanted to build this arch, we first have to go back another 200 [music] years.

[00:01:11]The arch sits on the grounds of the former Parlington Hall, home of the Gascoigne family.

[00:01:18]The Gascoignes bought Parlington from the Wentworth [music] family in 1546.

[00:01:24]The Wentworths were one of the richest and [music] most powerful aristocratic families in Britain with their estate, Wentworth Woodhouse, the largest private home in the country.

[00:01:35]So, the sale of the estate formed a connection between the Gascoignes and the Wentworths.

[00:01:41]Being two aristocratic families in Yorkshire, they probably popped over for tea quite a lot.

[00:01:47]Now, it's time to introduce another character.

[00:01:49]One of the most important British politicians during the revolutionary era was Charles Watson Wentworth of Wentworth [snorts] Woodhouse, better known as a Marquess of Rockingham.

[00:02:01]If you don't know much about the American Revolution, the name Rockingham might not mean anything.

[00:02:07]But if we want to do the story of Parlington Arch justice, and we do, then we need to explore the background to the revolution and why Rockingham is so important to it.

[00:02:19]The American Revolution.

[00:02:21]What was all that about, eh?

[00:02:23]Wasn't it all to do with taxes?

[00:02:26]Something like that. It's a bit more complicated.

[00:02:35]There were a number of tensions between the American colonies and the British government. Many of these stemmed from the earlier French and Indian War, which was fought between Britain and France with native tribes allied to both sides from 1754 to 1763.

[00:02:54]Britain won that war and gained the land formerly controlled by the French, everything east [music] of the Mississippi.

[00:03:02]For many American colonists, this was [music] great. They had all this new land to expand into.

[00:03:09]Unfortunately, the Native Americans were still living there.

[00:03:13]In 1763, a royal proclamation attempted to create a boundary between colonists and natives [music] by forbidding settlement beyond the Appalachians.

[00:03:25]This upset many colonists who wanted to expand westwards and many of them did so anyway.

[00:03:31]They also began to ask why Britain was telling them what to do.

[00:03:36]At the same time, the wars which Britain had fought in North America were very expensive. Britain's national debt almost doubled from 74 million pounds in 1756 [music] to 132 million pounds in 1763.

[00:03:53]To cover this, the British government decided to levy taxes on the people who, in their eyes, the war had been fought for in the first place.

[00:04:03]The 1765 Stamp Act imposed a direct tax on American colonies.

[00:04:09]This was very unpopular because the colonies were now paying money to the British government, but had no influence on [music] decisions made in Parliament.

[00:04:18]There was taxation without representation.

[00:04:21]And this is where Rockingham comes in.

[00:04:24]He became Prime Minister in 1765 and was broadly supportive of the American colonies. He repealed the hated Stamp Act in 1766, only a year after it came in.

[00:04:36]But he wasn't a revolutionary. He expected the 13 colonies to remain part of the British Empire.

[00:04:43]That same year, he passed the Declaratory Act, which declared that the British Parliament still had the authority to legislate directly in America.

[00:04:52]His attitude could be described as paternalistic.

[00:04:55]He said, I shall always consider that this country as the parent ought to be tender and just and that the colonies as children ought to be dutiful.

[00:05:05]Being Prime Minister isn't easy, especially when you have to balance the conflicting interests of parties and politicians. So, I think Rockingham did a decent job under the circumstances.

[00:05:17]He believed the Stamp Act to be wrong and didn't want to aggravate the colonies further.

[00:05:23]But he couldn't please everyone.

[00:05:25]Conflict in his party, they were called the Whigs, forced him out as Prime Minister in 1766.

[00:05:32]He would spend the next 15 years as a politician in opposition.

[00:05:37]But he still maintained an interest in the colonies.

[00:05:40]In 1771, Rockingham was at home at Wentworth Woodhouse when he received a distinguished American visitor, Benjamin Franklin.

[00:05:50]Meanwhile, Britain was piling more taxes on the Americans.

[00:05:55]The 1767 Townshend Act levied taxes on a number of imported goods, including tea.

[00:06:04]When the British government sent troops to enforce its authority, further unhappiness followed. [music] Rockingham's private secretary was the MP and political philosopher Edmund Burke, who also advocated for fairer treatment of the colonies. He famously said in 1775 that In this character of the Americans, a love of freedom is the predominating feature which marks and distinguishes the whole.

[00:06:29]This fierce spirit of liberty is stronger in the English colonies probably than in any other people of the earth.

[00:06:37]In 1773 came the famous Boston Tea Party when colonists, angry at the taxes on tea, dressed as Native Americans and dumped over 300 chests of tea into Boston Harbor.

[00:06:50]The Prime Minister, Lord North, >> [music] >> sought to punish Boston harshly.

[00:06:55]Rockingham agreed that the Tea Party was wrong, but thought Lord North had gone too far in his reprisals.

[00:07:02]Rockingham said, The conduct of the Americans cannot be justified. The folly and impolicy of the provocation deserves the fullest arraignment. And notwithstanding all that has passed, I can never give consent to proceeding with actual force against the colonies.

[00:07:21]Nevertheless, British troops were sent to occupy Boston and in 1775, the American Revolution kicked off.

[00:07:29]In January 1776, radical English philosopher Thomas Paine published a pamphlet Common Sense, which advocated for total American independence.

[00:07:40]It became one of the most important documents [music] in American history.

[00:07:45]Just 6 months later, on the 4th of July, 1776, representatives from the colonies came together to sign the Declaration of Independence.

[00:07:56]Now that we've covered the American Revolution, let's return to Thomas Gascoigne because we've ignored him for a bit.

[00:08:08]Whilst Rockingham was being a very important politician, Thomas Gascoigne, like most young men of wealth in the 18th century, was having an extended holiday in Europe.

[00:08:19]It was common for young aristocrats to go on long travels, learning history, art, philosophy, and rubbing shoulders with the other elites of society. These days, I just call it a gap year.

[00:08:32]Whilst Rockingham was sorting out the Stamp Act in 1765, Gascoigne was staying with friends in Italy. There is a strange story about Gascoigne being implicated in the murder of a coachman in Rome, later escaping with the help of a cardinal who obtained a papal pardon from Clement the 13th.

[00:08:51]Very strange.

[00:08:53]Gascoigne wanted to enter politics and fortunately had friends in high places.

[00:08:58]Rockingham, his neighbor and chum from Wentworth Woodhouse, promised him a seat in Parliament. He bought, because that is what you did back then, you bought your way into politics, the seat of Thirsk in North Yorkshire.

[00:09:12]Thomas Gascoigne in 1780 became member of Parliament for Thirsk. It's probably no coincidence that construction on the arch started just a year later. Not only was it a public endorsement of Rockingham, who had given him his parliamentary seat, but by this point, the War of Independence, now in its sixth year, was going badly for the British.

[00:09:36]In October 1781, British forces at Yorktown surrendered to George Washington, making it the last major land battle of the war.

[00:09:45]When Prime Minister Lord North, who had presided over the conflict, heard the news, he is said to have clutched his chest and exclaimed, "Oh God, it is all over."

[00:09:56]Lord North resigned and in 1782 was replaced by none other than Rockingham, who now pushed for formal peace with the Americans.

[00:10:05]Sadly, he died just 4 months after taking office and is buried at York Minster.

[00:10:11]Rockingham was looked on favorably in North America. Many places are named after him, including Rockingham in Vermont, North Carolina, New Hampshire, and Virginia.

[00:10:22]Back to the original question. Why did Thomas Gascoigne build the arch?

[00:10:27]It's actually a lot harder to answer that than you might think.

[00:10:30]American independence had been a humiliation for Britain, so this monument was a provocative public statement. You'd need significant sympathies with the Americans to risk [music] the damage to your domestic reputation.

[00:10:43]There's a story that when the Prince Regent, later King George the IV, was passing through the area, he refused to go into the house of a man who had perpetuate the memory of England's defeats.

[00:10:56]That being said, we don't actually know much about what Gascoigne himself said or thought. His only reported speech in Parliament was a motion for licensing horse dealers in 1784.

[00:11:09]He didn't stand up to give a bold speech about the virtues of liberty.

[00:11:14]So, it doesn't feel right to claim that Gascoigne was some sort of revolutionary when it seems he only became interested in the revolution in 1780, by which point the Americans were already winning. And it's a bit of a coincidence that work started on the arch after Rockingham helped him become a politician, as though it was a grand gesture of thanks.

[00:11:37]Gascoigne may have had complex reasons for building the arch, but the story of Parlington arch is nevertheless a fascinating one, and it reminds us that history is always more complicated than we might think. There were a variety of attitudes in Britain towards the emerging United States.

[00:11:56]Sadly, the arch is all that remains of Parlington Hall. It was lived in for over 350 years until it was abandoned in 1905 and later demolished. Many of the contents were given to Lotherton Hall, which was also owned by the Gascoignes.

[00:12:12]But, the arch itself remains a surprising reminder that many British politicians recognized and supported the American Revolution, with one of them willing to construct a lasting monument to one of the most significant periods in history.

[00:12:29]>> [music] [music] [music]