Particularly for an American, London is a breathtakingly old city, packed with history. Lest you forget this fact, the city is filled with buildings adorned with plaques that tell you when Samuel Pepys lived there, or which novels Charles Dickens wrote while residing at that address. There are plaques not just for obvious London suspects like Gilbert & Sullivan and Winston Churchill, but for foreigners like Frederic Chopin (who gave his last public performance at #4 St. James Place) and Karl Marx(who lived at 28 Dean Street while writing Das Kapital). George Frederick Handel has a plaque at 25 Brook Street, and next door at 23 Brook Street is a plaque to Jimi Hendrix–as if some cosmic force has ensured that musicians in London are arranged in strictly alphabetical order.
Even amongst this distinguished company, there is one plaque in London that is unequelled for the pleasure it gives to all who behold it. It is a tribute to a great American patriot, and it cannot help but stir the noblest feelings in all those of my countrymen who have the privilege of gazing upon it.

That is an actual, unretouched photo of a plaque that adorns a historic building on Gloucester Place, a few blocks south of the Baker Street tube station.
I don’t know who wrote the text that emblazons it, or when. I don’t know if there’s any significance to the fact that it’s about twice the size of Ben Franklin’s plaque. What I do know is that it serves as proof that history is not always written by the winners. Sometimes, it’s written by whoever has access to metalworking equipment.
My favorite part is the logo of the interlocking British and American flags. Thanks to that graphic, even a passerby who’s never heard of Major General Arnold can know that, whatever the man did, it must have been something great for the cause of Anglo-American friendship.
(If you’d like a larger version of the photo, suitable for use as a desktop, you can find it by clicking on the image above.)
Welcome, Kottke.org readers! If you enjoy this piece, you might like to browse the rest of the site, too. Particularly popular entries include Touch My Bum, On The Poetry Of London Place Names, The Toblerone Millionaire, and Marxist-Socialist Spiderman (which are quite short), and Truffle In Paradise (which is somewhat longer). Or you could start at the very beginning, with the first entry.Take your pick.