Charles Sargeant Jagger, M.C. 1885-1934

The British School at Rome

Sold, Sotheby's London, November 25th, 1987, lot 91, illustrated

Peter Nahum, Ltd., London

Acquired from the above, 1987

Charles Sargeant Jagger M.C. served as a private in the Artists Rifles and as a Lieutenant in the Worcester Regiment. He was wounded in the trenches, and received the Military Cross. After the war, Jagger was given a number of important commisions, including his best known, the Royal Artillary Memorial at Hyde Park Corner.

The present work is a maquette for the West Kirby Memorial (1919-1922) which was commisioned for Grange Hill, above Hoylake and West Kirby. The memorial consists of a granite obelisk against which stand life-size bronzes of a female figure, Humanity and the bronze version of the soldier seen here, originally referred to as Solider on Defence. With the production of a later bronze edition, the title Wipers was added- British military slang for the Belgian town Ypres. Wipers is a fine example of Jagger's realism, but also of his ability to humanize the face of war. His Memorial works aimed, according to his writings, to show 'the Tommy as I knew him in the trenches'.