Donington’s Matthew Flinders statue is cleaned by Faye Le Blanc

The statue of Matthew Flinders and his beloved cat Trim have also been given a spruce up ahead of the hero’s homecoming.

Sculptor Faye Le Blanc popped along to Donington’s Market Place to clean the patina from the bronze statues which her mother, the late Judith Holmes Drewry, had created back in 2006.

Using a blow torch and specialist chemicals, Faye spent three hours cleaning the statue before giving it a fresh coat of wax.

Faye, of Le Blanc Fine Art in Saxby, said: “I had read about that the celebration was coming up and thought the statue was going to be in the news a lot.

“I have been meaning to do it for a while but it got pushed to the top of my to do list.

“I am really pleased with how it looks and I had a lovely email from Jane Pearson. A lot of locals also stopped to talk to me which was nice.”

Judith was commissioned in 2006 to create the statue by Fens Tourism in a bid to raise awareness of Flinders in his home country - despite being seen as a hero in Australia.

A total of 30 students from the then Thomas Cowley High School, now renamed as Cowley Academy, took part in a workshop to help create the sculpture with Judith.

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