First child- Raymond Watson on the Effra
The River Effra, one of south London’s now-hidden rivers, once flowed close to the surface here, running along the route that Brixton Road still follows today. Though long since forced underground and absorbed into the Victorian sewer system, the Effra’s course continues to define the landscape. Max Roach Park, thin and linear, marks part of that old river path and it is here, at the corner of Brixton Road and St John’s Crescent, that a quietly powerful memorial stands.
The sculpture is First Child by Raymond Watson, installed in 1998. It commemorates the Soweto Uprising of 16 June 1976, when South African schoolchildren protesting against apartheid education policies were met with lethal violence. The title refers to the first child killed that day a symbol of innocence lost and by extension the 116 children who died during the uprising. Rather than depicting protest or confrontation, Watson chose a restrained, almost intimate form, allowing grief and dignity to speak louder than spectacle.
The work also holds a significant place in British cultural history. First Child is recognised as one of the first permanent public sculptures in the UK by a Black artist, making its presence in Brixton an area shaped by migration, resistance, and political expression especially resonant.
Set beside the invisible flow of the Effra, the sculpture gains an added layer of meaning. Just as the river still moves unseen beneath the pavement, the memory of injustice and struggle continues beneath the surface of everyday life. In this small patch of green, global history, local activism, and the buried natural world quietly converge.
