Some Details from the Abbey

 Adding to the beauty of the carvings and decorations are the subtle colour changes in the beige stone.

 So many different patterns and yet they all work well together.

 Westminster Column is just outside the Abbey and was built in memory of the men who died fighting in the Crimean War and the Indian Mutiny in the mid 1800's.

 The side panels probably had stain glass in them originally.  Many of the windows simply have plain glass or have been closed completely.

 A series of ten statues on the front of the Abbey in recognition of ten modern martyrs.  In this group, Archibishop Luwum killed by Idi Amin; Grand Duchess Elizabeth of Russia, renowned for her work with the poor, killed by the Bolsheviks; Martin Luther King.

 Esther John, a Pakistani girl killed for being a Christian; Lucian Tapiede, a Christian from Papua New Guinea killed by the Japanese; Wang Zhiming, a Chinese pastor killed in the Cultural Revolution.  The other 4 statues are Manche Masemola, a South African girl, killed by her parents because she became a Christian; Maximillian Kolbe, a Polish Franciscan friar who asked to be and was killed instead of another prisoner in Auschwitz; Dietrich Bonhoeffer, a German Lutheran pastor who spoke out against the Nazis and was killed by them; and Oscar Romero, RC Archbishop in El Salvador who championed the poor but was assassinated in 1980.

Click on the photos for a bigger view.