Trinitatis Church was originally surrounded by a cemetery where Ewald and Wessel were buried. The cemetery disappeared in the aftermath of the Copenhagen Fire of 1795. In the 1870s, a committee launched a campaign to create a monument in memory of the two poets and it was supported by the City and with the Eibeschütz Grant for the Embellishment of the City ("Det Eibeschützske Legat til Stadens Forskjønnelse"). Otto Evens was charged with designing the monument which was unveiled in 1879.