Should Henry Morton Stanley’s statue be pulled down?

Should Stanley fall? Debate is raging over whether a statue of the Victorian explorer Henry Morton Stanley, which was erected in his home town of Denbigh in Wales a few years ago, should be pulled down because of his racist views.

Stanley is, of course, best known for the four words he uttered when he found Dr Livingstone destitute in the middle of Africa. But his lesser-known activities during his travels have now led to a public consultation being set up in the wake of last summer’s Black Lives Matter protests. That consultation is tasked with deciding the fate of his statue. So should the monument follow the lead of Edward Colston and be taken down?

Stanley’s defenders point to the explorer’s writings, in which he passionately rallied against the evils of slavery, to suggest that Denbigh’s most famous son has been unfairly maligned and his statue should stay. Missing from the debate though is Stanley’s dark record when it comes to slavery, and how he actually behaved in Africa.