It was funded via public subscription and consists of a statue of Earl Grey on a pedestal standing on top of a Roman Doric column.

The column was designed by local architect, Benjamin Green, and the statue was created by the sculptor, Edward Hodges Baily.

A contemporary report of the unveiling ceremony described the monument as "a fine imaginative work of art" and other 19th century commentators praised it as "a noble effort of genius" and as having "a most commanding appearance".

However, its location, then at the centre of the city's tram infrastructure, was criticised as unsuitable, with one newspaper declaring that "in its present situation, it will be a great nuisance" and, in the 1920s, there were calls to move the column to improve traffic flow.

Green envisaged a statue in Northumberland Square, North Shields, depicting Grey in parliamentary robes, holding the Magna Carta.

He sought public subscriptions for his scheme in the Newcastle Chronicle on 16 June 1832:[1] Instead of expressing our grateful Joy in the childish Barbarism of wasteful and dangerous Illuminations, which blaze for an Hour and are forgotten for ever; let us erect a Monument that shall commemorate to future Ages our Gratitude to the Friend of the People!

[8] The eventual site of the monument in central Newcastle was chosen as part of a local improvement plan proposed by Richard Grainger.

[10] Joseph Welch, who had previously built the Ouseburn Viaduct and Bellingham Bridge, was in charge of building the monument.

It contained a hermetically sealed glass bottle which contained a drawing of the structure, a collection of coins, local medals and tradesmen's tokens donated by John Ralph Fenwick, and a list of the monument's subscribers[17][18] Following the completion of the column on 11 August 1838,[17] the Earl and Countess Grey visited Newcastle and were reported to have shown "evident signs of pleasure" when viewing the structure.

[1][22] A helical staircase with 164 steps[17] leads to a viewing platform at the top of the monument, which is occasionally opened to the public.

[1] During a thunderstorm on 25 July 1941, the head of the statue, which weighed around 102 kg (225 lb),[b] was knocked off by a bolt of lightning[1] and fell onto the tram lines below the monument.

[30] The Newcastle Estate and Property Committee agreed that the statue would not be repaired until after the Second World War, but the head would be retained and restored.

On the opposite face is a later inscription from 1932, installed at the request of Sir Charles Trevelyan, 100 years after the passing of the Great Reform Act.

[1] A column in The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction in 1838 wrote that the statue "is a faithful representation of the noble Lord,—and esteemed a fine imaginative work of art".

[33] In 1857, a writer local to Newcastle wrote "the monument to Earl Grey is, to my mind, a huge mistake; you place an aged nobleman, dressed in court costume, on a high pillar, and, without a hat upon his bald head, expose him to the pelting of every storm that Heaven sends".

[1] In the 1920s, there were calls from the Durham Branch of the Surveyors' Institution to remove and relocate the monument, due to its growing obstruction of the traffic.

[22] In the second half of the 20th century there were multiple calls (in 1982, 1994 and 1998) for the monument to be renovated, but these were dismissed due to the estimated cost and recognition that previous repairs had led to long-term damage by pollution.