Online Exhibition: The Great Exhibition 1851

Introduction

The Great exhibition of 1851 was a defining moment in Victorian Society. It brought together every important type and process of manufacture then known, at a time when life was being transformed by the Industrial Revolution. The idea of progress, coupled with the growth of wealth and prosperity through manufacture and innovation captured the popular imagination of mid-Victorian Britain.

The Town Library is lucky to possess good copies of many of Exhibition, or produced afterwards as a celebratory record of the event. The Collection also includes Reports of the Commissioners for the Exhibition, and some scrapbooks of ephemeral material collected at the Exhibition itself.

An 1851 lithograph showing the Indian display at the Crystal Palace Great Exhibition, featuring a massive taxidermy elephant under a golden canopy surrounded by Victorian visitors.

The Building

The Building was erected in London’s Hyde Park to house the Great Exhibition. It occupied an area of about 19 acres when built. After the Exhibition was announced some 245 designs were submitted to the Building Committee, but none of them proved acceptable. Amid a welter of controversy Joseph Paxton publicly proposed his own spectacular glass palace by appealing over the heads of the Building Committee – printing his design for a “Crystal Palace” in the Illustrated London News.

Contractors took over the site in Hyde Park at the end of July 1850 and construction started in August, and was eventually completed by 1st May 1851.

The main building was 1,848 feet long by 408 feet broad (although an extension on the north side gave it a maximum breadth of 456 feet), with 3 entrances, and 17 exits. The height of the nave was 63 feet, and the height of the transept was 108 feet. It was so tall that three large elm trees were left to grow inside the building. Altogether 4,500 tons of iron and 600,000 cubic feet of timber were used in construction, and the building was finished with 293,655 panes of glass.

Hunt’s Handbook to the Official Catalogues

Hunt’s Handbook to the Official Catalogues Two volumes bound in blue cloth with design of the building stamped in gold on the front cover. Published by Spicer Brothers & W. Clowes & Sons.

Robert Hunt the editor, was described as “Keeper of Mining Records” and author of Researches on Light, The Poetry of Science, Synopsis, etc.

Official descriptive and Illustrated Catalogue

3 volumes, plus an additional supplemental volume. This, the official catalogue of the Great Exhibition describes the construction of the building, outlines the arrangement of the exhibits, provides an index of the people named in the Catalogue, as well as giving detailed descriptions and illustrations of individual exhibits.

There were 13,937 exhibitors (7,381 from the British Isles and the Empire, and 6,556 foreign exhibitors). There were more than 100,000 exhibits on display, occupying a total of 991,857 square feet of space.

Kitson, Thompson & Hewitson’s Locomotive Tank Engine

Constructed to run light express trains, Kitson’s engine had two water tanks, beneath the boiler and footplate, and did not require a tender. The driving wheels were 6 feet in diameter. The side elevation is reproduced from the official Descriptive and Illustrated Catalogue.

Waiting for Queen Victoria to open the Great Exhibition

Frontispiece for Dickinson’s Comprehensive Pictures of the Great Exhibition of 1851. 2 volumes, 1854.

Published by Dickinson, Brothers, Her Majesty’s Publishers of New Bond Street. The lithographic illustrations were reproduced from originals painted by Nash, Haghe and Roberts (RA).

The Inauguration

The sky was described as a cloudless “Italian” blue.

France

The French exhibits featured high quality craftsmanship in precious metals, and a large number of prize medals were won by French gold and silversmiths. Note the gallery to provide an upper level.

Tunis

Tunisian costume, the use of henna as a dye, and a tent made of “goats’ hair” attracted considerable attention.

Turkey

Ornamental saddles, little silver coffee cup-holders and decorative narguilles, or hookahs, beautifully ornamented with silver were included in the display. The accompanying text is both patronising and packed with racial stereotypes.

India

The India display was notable for the elephant from Saffron Walden Museum, which had to be transported to London for the occasion. It was in fact an African elephant, but was the only elephant specimen available in the country.

The Foreign Nave

The Transept

The transept was 108 feet high. Note the elm tree behind the fountain.

Moving Machinery

Appold’s Centrifugal Pump was held up as an “excellent example of the modern religion of mechanics – making a small machine do a great amount of work by moving it at great speed”.

Closing Ceremony

The Great Exhibition ended on the 15th October 1851. During the 5 months it was open it was visited by some 6,039,195 visitors. The largest attendance recorded on a single day saw 109,915 people visiting.