Help the hero – new home for Shrewsbury's Lord Hill

Lord Hill might be one of our county's most famous generals, but how the mighty have fallen.

His statue standing high atop The Column outside the Shirehall in Shrewsbury is crumbling – and a magnificent giant portrait of him that once took pride of place on the staircase of the old Guildhall at Dogpole is packed away.

The painting, Beechey's General Rowland, Lord Hill, is in store in a packing case in Ludlow, away from public gaze.

Much of the problem is that the artwork Lord Hill is a lot of hero to handle, at 10 feet tall, so finding a suitable place to show him off is proving problematic.

Now Paul Ridgley of the Waterloo Association, in this bicentenary year of the Battle of Waterloo, is calling for that painting of Lord Hill, one of the Duke of Wellington's most trusted generals, to take its rightful place in the spotlight once more.

Lord Hill was one of Wellington's commanders at the Battle of Waterloo in 1815, but was already a local hero in Shropshire. He had made his name in the Peninsular War as Wellington's right hand man in a long, bloody, but ultimately successful campaign against Napoleon's forces in Spain and Portugal.

Paul, of Baschurch, has long taken an interest in the fate of the 190-year-old painting, a piece of Shropshire's heritage which according to him only narrowly avoided being sold off off a few years ago.

He said: "I am dismayed that this fantastic painting of Shropshire's most famous soldier is not thought fit to be on public display by the county council. I have been told that the painting can be viewed by appointment. Nobody seems in the least bit interested."

He says that Lord Hill presented the painting of himself to the Corporation of Shrewsbury in 1826. It was by famous artist Sir William Beechey and depicted Hill at his victory at Almaraz in May 1812.

He added: "The painting used to hang on the staircase of the old Guildhall in Dogpole. When the council moved to the new Guildhall in 2003, the painting was removed. At this point I found out that, along with other paintings belonging to the Shrewsbury & Atcham Borough Council, it was to be sold.

"I attended a council meeting on January 21, 2004, and put forward my reasons for keeping the painting, the main reason being that this painting is part of the heritage of Shrewsbury and indeed the County of Shropshire. If it should disappear from public sight, as did Lord Hill's medals and decorations – they are in a private collection in India – then it would be a sad day for us all. The council agreed with me and it was decided to store the painting in London with a view to exhibit it in the new museum at the Music Hall when it was opened.

"When the new museum opened at the Music Hall, I inquired as to where was the painting. It was not on display and it was not known where the painting was kept. I assumed that it was still in storage in London. This was not the case. After a number of phone calls to the council and the museum service it appears that at some time in the past it was decided that the storage costs were too high and the painting was brought back to Shropshire.

"It has been kept in store in a packing case in a room at Ludlow Library for some considerable time now.

"From inquiries I have made, no one is interested in exhibiting it in the Music Hall. Apparently there is no room."