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Story: Memorials and monuments

Cargill monument, Dunedin

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Cargill monument, Dunedin

A monument to William Cargill, leader of the Free Church migration to Otago and first superintendent of the province, was put up in Dunedin in 1864, four years after his death. The monument was first erected in the Octagon but was moved to the Exchange in 1872. It was not a statue but a Gothic revival spire, and it had other intended functions besides remembering Cargill – it was planned as a gas lamp, a drinking fountain and a viewing platform in the middle of a garden. However, the garden never came about, the drinking fountains were not connected, and in the early 2000s the memorial no longer served to provide light.

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Otago Daily Times

Reference: 27 November 2008, p. 18

by Jane Dawber

Permission of the Otago Daily Times must be obtained before any re-use of this image.

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How to cite this page

Jock Phillips, Memorials and monuments – 19th-century memorials, Te Ara – the Encyclopedia of New Zealand, https://teara.govt.nz/en/photograph/32517/cargill-monument-dunedin (accessed 4 June 2026).

Story by Jock Phillips, published 14 March 2012, updated 26 March 2015.