Colston statue has been taken out of Bristol Harbour

The statue was retrieved at 5am this morning


The statue of slave trader Edward Colston has been fished out of Bristol Harbour after Black Lives Matter protesters rolled it in on Sunday.

Bristol council fished the Colston statue out of the harbour at 5am today, because the city had a “working harbour”.

The statue will now become a museum exhibit.

Colston statue removed from Bristol Harbour

Colston being dragged out of the harbour. It's better if you watch it backwards…(Video: Bristol City Council)

Posted by The Tab Bristol on Thursday, 11 June 2020

Ray Barnett, head of collections and archives at Bristol City Council said: “We had a diver down there who attached the ropes to crane it out of the water and take it away.

“The ropes that were tied around him, the spray paint added to him, is still there so we will keep it like that.”

The statue will only be hosed down, in order to ensure that “we preserve him as he was tipped in to the dock.”

This comes after the Mayor of Bristol, Marvin Rees, announced that he felt “no sense of loss” for the statue, but encouraged its position in a museum as the actions of the protesters are “now part of that statue’s story”

Featured image and video: @Bristolcouncil

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