The display in Hyde Park commenced with a naval engagement on the Serpentine between model warships representing the English and the combined French and American Fleets. This item, which lasted three hours, was followed by a display of water fireworks. The display in Green Park commenced at ten o’clock, one of the chief items being the “grand metamorphosis of the Castle into the Temple of Concord.” This change, says a writer in “The Times” of the period, “was made with somewhat less celerity than those witnessed in our theatrical pantomimes. It resembled rather the cautious removal of a screen than the sudden leap into a new shape. When fully developed, however, it presented a spectacle which excited general approbation.”
The Temple of Concord was an elaborate structure illuminated with coloured lamps, and decorated with gilding, festoons, etc., and transparent paintings. It was designed by Smirke, the paintings being by Stodard, Howard, Hilton, and others, and represented such subjects as “The Golden Age,” and “Peace restored to Earth.”
Charles Lamb, in a letter to William Wordsworth, dated August 9th, 1814, after describing the havoc wrought in the park by the crowds and booths, remarks that: “After all the fireworks were splendent—the Rockets in clusters, in trees and all shapes, spreading about like young stars in the making floundering about in space (like unbroke horses) till some of Newton’s calculations should fix them, but then they went out. Anyone who could see ’em and the still finer showers of gloomy rain fire that fell sulkily and angrily from ’em, and could go to bed without dreaming of the Last Day, must be as hardened an Atheist as ****.”
St. James’s Park was reserved for those who paid for admission. The trees were illuminated with lamps, and a Chinese bridge, which had been erected over the lake, was similarly treated. The use of gas on this structure must be one of the earliest occasions of its being employed for outdoor illuminations of this nature. Neither can the result be considered altogether successful, as the building caught fire towards the end of the firework display, and a lamplighter, who appears to have been caught by the flames in an attempt to throw himself into the water, was killed. Other men similarly employed were also severely burned. These men, evidently through ignorance, had started lighting the lower lamps first, working upwards on the structure, until they found themselves in a position of intolerable heat with no means of descending.
The pyrotechnic display consisted chiefly of aerial fireworks with gerbs, roman candles, fountains, and wheels; there do not appear to have been many devices of any size. “The Times” reporter complains that “the repetition of these things, with occasional pauses, for more than two hours became tedious to all.”
The coronation of George IV, in 1821, was celebrated by a display in Hyde Park, including land and water fireworks, superintended by Congreve. The displays on the coronation of William IV, in 1831, were directed by Congreve’s successor, Sir Augustus Frazer, but appear to have been of an insignificant character.
Queen Victoria’s coronation was celebrated by displays in Hyde Park and Green Park, conducted by Southby and D’Ernst, which exhibitions included a Temple on similar lines to that of 1814.
In France, during the first few years of the nineteenth century, there were many pyrotechnic displays of importance. Napoleon is credited with being extremely partial to such exhibitions. Displays took place in Paris in the Champs Elysées, at the barriere Chaillot, before Les Invalides in 1801 to celebrate the foundation of the Republic, and in the following year in honour of Napoleon’s arrival in that city.
Major-General Lord Blayney, who was captured by Napoleon’s troops in the Peninsula in 1810, travelled on parole across Spain and France on his way to Verdun. His somewhat leisurely journey of nearly six months enabled him to witness many celebrations of French victories in the towns through which he passed. He records having seen fireworks and illuminations among other places at Malaga and Orleans.
In 1804 a display was given by Napoleon before the Hotel de Ville, Paris, on his assumption of the title of Emperor of the French. The scenery provided for this display took the form of a representation of Mount St. Bernard, with a figure symbolising Napoleon mounted on a charger on the summit.