Cambridge War Memorial

Cambridge War Memorial is a war memorial on Hills Road, Cambridge, outside Cambridge University Botanic Garden. It comprises a bronze statue of a marching soldier by Canadian sculptor Robert Tait McKenzie, known as "The Homecoming" or sometimes "Coming Home", mounted on a heavily carved limestone plinth. It was unveiled in 1922, and became a Grade II listed building in 1996.

After the First World War, there were long debates in Cambridge about the appropriate type of war memorial, its location, and how the necessary funds should be raised, involving representatives of the city and the university. Proposals included a clock tower, cottages for injured soldiers, public amenities, or improvements at Addenbrooke's Hospital. A memorial committee was convened in January 1919 by the Lord Lieutenant of Cambridgeshire Charles Adeane, with its members drawn from Cambridgeshire County Council, the borough councils in Cambridge and Ely, and the University of Cambridge. Members included the Vice-Chancellor of the University of Cambridge Arthur Shipley (who was also Master of Christ's College, Cambridge); the Mayor of Cambridge Ralph Starr and his deputy, the previous year's mayor, Rev Dr Edmund Pearce (who was also Master of Corpus Christi College, Cambridge); Colonel Walter Harding of Madingley Hall and John Chivers from the Chivers and Sons jam making business in Histon; the Dean of Ely Cathedral Alexander Kirkpatrick (also former Masters of Selwyn College, Cambridge), the Mayor of Wisbech, and the surveyor Charles Bidwell of Bidwells. In April 1919, the committee recommended three parallel memorials: one at Addenbrooke's, a memorial listing the names of the war dead at Ely Cathedral, and a large monument in Cambridge itself. Fundraising carried on through 1919 to raise the estimated £30,000 for all three works, two-thirds of which was earmarked for Addenbrooke's, but progress was slow. By December 1919, only £12,000 had been raised, of which £6,000 was donated to Addenbrooke's and put towards building a new nurses' home, which was completed in 1924; its origins as a war memorial had been forgotten by the time the hospital moved away from the Old A

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