Epitaphs on Soldiers and Sailors. |
We give a few of the many curious epitaphs placed to the memory of soldiers and sea-faring men. Our initial epitaph is taken from Longnor churchyard, Staffordshire, and it tells the story of an extended and eventful life:— In memory of William Billinge, who was Born in a Corn Field at Fawfield head, in this Parish, in the year 1679. At the age of 23 years he enlisted into His Majesty’s service under Sir George Rooke, and was at the taking of the Fortress of Gibralter in 1704. He afterwards served under the Duke of Marlborough at Ramillies, fought on the 23rd of May, 1706, where he was wounded by a musket-shot in his thigh. Afterwards returned to his native country, and with manly courage defended his sovereign’s rights in the Rebellion in 1715 and 1745. He died within the space of 150 yards of where he was born, and was interred here the 30th January, 1791, aged 112 years. Billeted by death, I quartered here remain,
And when the trumpet sounds I’ll rise and march again. On a Chelsea Hospital veteran we have the following interesting epitaph:— Here lies William Hiseland,
A Veteran, if ever Soldier was,
Who merited well a Pension,
If long service be a merit,
Having served upwards of the days of Man.
Ancient, but not superannuated;
Engaged in a Series of Wars,
Civil as well as Foreign,
Yet maimed or worn out by neither.
His complexion was Fresh and Florid;
His Health Hale and Hearty;
His memory Exact and Ready.
In Stature
He exceeded the Military Size;
In Strength
He surpassed the Prime of Youth;
And
What rendered his age still more Patriarchal,
When above a Hundred Years old
He took unto him a Wife!
Read! fellow Soldiers, and reflect
That there is a Spiritual Warfare,
As well as a Warfare Temporal.
Born the 1st August, 1620,
Died the 17th of February, 1732,
Aged One Hundred and Twelve. At Bremhill, Wiltshire, the following lines are placed to the memory of a soldier who reached the advanced age of 92 years:— A poor old soldier shall not lie unknown,
Without a verse and this recording stone.
’Twas his, in youth, o’er distant lands to stray,
Danger and death companions of his way.
Here, in his native village, stealing age
Closed the lone evening of his pilgrimage.
Speak of the past—of names of high renown,
Or brave commanders long to dust gone down,
His look with instant animation glow’d,
Tho’ ninety winters on his head had snow’d.
His country, while he lived, a boon supplied,
And Faith her shield held o’er him when he died. | The following inscription is engraved on a piece of copper affixed to one of the pillars in Winchester Cathedral:— | A Memoriall. | For the renowned Martialist Richard Boles of ye
Right Worshypful family of the Boles, in
Linckhorne Sheire: Colonell of a Ridgment of Foot
of 1300, who for his Gratious King Charles ye First
did wounders at the Battell of Edge Hill; his last
Action, to omit all others was att Alton in the
County of Southampton, was surprised by five or
Six Thousand of the Rebells, who caught him there
Quartered to fly to the church, with near fourscore
of his men who there fought them six or seven
Houers, and then the Rebells breaking in upon them
he slew with his sword six or seven of them, and
then was slayne himself, with sixty of his men aboute
him | | 1641. | His Gratious Sovereign hearing of his death, gave
him his high comendation in ys pationate expression,
Bring me a moorning scarffe, i have lost
One of the best Commanders in this Kingdome.
Alton will tell you of his famous fight
Which ys man made and bade the world good night
His verteous life feared not Mortality
His body must his vertues cannot Die.
Because his Bloud was there so nobly spent,
This is his Tomb, that church his monument. | Ricardus Boles in Art. Mag.
Composuit, Posuitque, Dolens,
An. Dm. 1689. | On one of the buttresses on the south side of St. Mary’s Church, at Beverley, is an oval tablet, to commemorate the fate of two Danish soldiers, who, during their voyage to Hull, to join the service of the Prince of Orange, in 1689, quarrelled, and having been marched with the troops to Beverley, during their short stay there sought a private meeting to settle their differences by the sword. Their melancholy end is recorded in a doggerel epitaph, of which we give an illustration. In the parish registers the following entries occur:— | 1689, | December 16.— | Daniel Straker, a Danish trooper buried. | | " | December 23.— | Johannes Frederick Bellow, a Danish
trooper, beheaded for killing the other,
buried. | “The mode of execution was,” writes the Rev. Jno. Pickford, M.A., “it may be presumed, by a broad two-handed sword, such a one as Sir Walter Scott has particularly described in ‘Anne of Geierstein,’ as used at the decapitation of Sir Archibald de Hagenbach, and which the executioner is described as wielding with such address and skill. The Danish culprit was, like the oppressive knight, probably bound and seated in a chair; but such swords as those depicted on the tablet could not well have been used for the purpose, for they are long, narrow in the blade, and perfectly straight.” TABLET IN ST. MARY’S CHURCH, BEVERLEY. We have in the diary of Abraham de la Pryme, the Yorkshire antiquary, some very interesting particulars respecting the Danes. Writing in 1689, the diarist tells us: “Towards the latter end of the aforegoing year, there landed at Hull about six or seven thousand Danes, all stout fine men, the best equip’d and disciplin’d of any that was ever seen. They were mighty godly and religious. You would seldom or never hear an oath or ugly word come out of their mouths. They had a great many ministers amongst them, whome they call’d pastours, and every Sunday almost, ith’ afternoon, they prayed and preach’d as soon as our prayers was done. They sung almost all their divine service, and every ministre had those that made up a quire whom the rest follow’d. Then there was a sermon of about half-an-houre’s length, all memoratim, and then the congregation broke up. When they administered the sacrament, the ministre goes into the church and caused notice to be given thereof, then all come before, and he examined them one by one whether they were worthy to receive or no. If they were he admitted them, if they were not he writ their names down in a book, and bid them prepare against the next Sunday. Instead of bread in the sacrament, I observed that they used wafers about the bigness and thickness of a sixpence. They held it no sin to play at cards upon Sundays, and commonly did everywhere where they were suffered; for indeed in many places the people would not abide the same, but took the cards from them. Tho’ they loved strong drink, yet all the while I was amongst them, which was all this winter, I never saw above five or six of them drunk.” The diarist tells us that the strangers liked this country. It appears they worked for the farmers, and sold tumblers, cups, spoons, etc., which they had imported, to the English. They acted in the courthouse a play in their own language, and realised a good sum of money by their performances. The design of the piece was “Herod’s Tyranny—The Birth of Christ—The Coming of the Wise Men.” A correspondent states that in Battersea Church there is a handsome monument to Sir Edward Wynter, a captain in the East India Company’s service in the reign of Charles II., which records that in India, where he had passed many years of his life, he was A rare example, and unknown to most,
Where wealth is gain’d, and conscience is not lost;
Nor less in martial honour was his name,
Witness his actions of immortal fame.
Alone, unharm’d, a tiger he opprest,
And crush’d to death the monster of a beast.
Thrice twenty mounted Moors he overthrew,
Singly, on foot, some wounded, some he slew,
Dispersed the rest,—what more could Samson do?
True to his friends, a terror to his foes,
Here now in peace his honour’d bones repose. | Below, in bas-relief, he is represented struggling with the tiger, both the combatants appearing in the attitude of wrestlers. He is also depicted in the performance of the yet more wonderful achievement, the discomfiture of the “thrice twenty mounted Moors,” who are all flying before him. In Yarmouth churchyard, a monumental inscription tells a painful story as follows:— To the memory of George Griffiths, of the Shropshire Militia, who died Feb. 26th, 1807, in consequence of a blow received in a quarrel with his comrade. Time flies away as nature on its wing,
I in a battle died (not for my King).
Words with my brother soldier did take place,
Which shameful is, and always brings disgrace.
Think not the worse of him who doth remain,
For he as well as I might have been slain. | We have also from Yarmouth the next example:— To the memory of Isaac Smith, who died March 24th, 1808, and Samuel Bodger, who died April 2nd, 1808, both of the Cambridgeshire Militia. The tyrant Death did early us arrest,
And all the magazines of life possest:
No more the blood its circling course did run,
But in the veins like icicles it hung;
No more the hearts, now void of quickening heat,
The tuneful march of vital motion beat;
Stiffness did into every sinew climb,
And a short death crept cold through every limb. | The next example is from Bury St. Edmunds:— William Middleditch,
Late Serjeant-Major of the Grenadier Guards,
Died Nov. 13, 1834, aged 53 years. | A husband, father, comrade, friend sincere,
A British soldier brave lies buried here.
In Spain and Flushing, and at Waterloo,
He fought to guard our country from the foe;
His comrades, Britons, who survive him, say
He acted nobly on that glorious day. | Edward Parr died in 1811, at the age of 38 years, and was buried in North Scarle churchyard. His epitaph states:— A soldier once I was, as you may see,
My King and Country claim no more from me.
In battle I receiv’d a dreadful ball
Severe the blow, and yet I did not fall.
When God commands, we all must die it’s true
Farewell, dear Wife, Relations all, adieu. | A tablet in Chester Cathedral reads as follows:— To the Memory of
John Moore Napier
Captain in Her Majesty’s 62nd Regiment
Who died of Asiatic Cholera
in Scinde
on the 7th of July, 1846
Aged 29 years. | The tomb is no record of high lineage;
His may be traced by his name;
His race was one of soldiers.
Among soldiers he lived; among them he died;
A soldier falling, where numbers fell with him,
In a barbarous land.
Yet there was none died more generous,
More daring, more gifted, or more religious.
On his early grave
Fell the tears of stern and hardy men,
As his had fallen on the graves of others. | A British soldier lies buried under the shadow of the fine old Minster of Beverley. He died in 1855, and his epitaph states:— A soldier lieth beneath the sod,
Who many a field of battle trod:
When glory call’d, his breast he bar’d,
And toil and want, and danger shar’d.
Like him through all thy duties go;
Waste not thy strength in useless woe,
Heave thou no sigh and shed no tear,
A British soldier slumbers here. |
A GRAVESTONE IN BRIGHTON CHURCHYARD.The stirring lives of many female soldiers have furnished facts for several important historical works, and rich materials for the writers of romance. We give an illustration of the stone erected by public subscription in Brighton churchyard over the remains of a notable female warrior, named Phoebe Hessel. The inscription tells the story of her long and eventful career. The closing years of her life were cheered by the liberality of George IV. During a visit to Brighton, when he was Prince Regent, he met old Phoebe, and was greatly interested in her history. He ascertained that she was supported by a few benevolent townsmen, and the kind-hearted Prince questioned her respecting the amount that would be required to enable her to pass the remainder of her days in comfort. “Half-a-guinea a week,” said Phoebe Hessel, “will make me as happy as a princess.” That amount by order of her royal benefactor was paid to her until the day of her death. She told capital stories, had an excellent memory, and was in every respect most agreeable company. Her faculties remained unimpaired to within a few hours of her death. On September 22nd, 1821, she was visited by a person of some literary taste, and the following particulars were obtained respecting her life. The writer states:—“I have seen to-day an extraordinary character in the person of Phoebe Hessel, a poor woman stated to be 108 years of age. It appears that she was born in March, 1715, and at fifteen formed a strong attachment to Samuel Golding, a private in the regiment called Kirk’s Lambs, which was ordered to the West Indies. She determined to follow her lover, enlisted into the 5th regiment of foot, commanded by General Pearce, and embarked after him. She served there five years without discovering herself to anyone. At length they were ordered to Gibraltar. She was likewise at Montserrat, and would have been in action, but her regiment did not reach the place till the battle was decided. Her lover was wounded at Gibraltar and sent to Plymouth; she then waited on the General’s lady at Gibraltar, disclosed her sex, told her story, and was immediately sent home. On her arrival, Phoebe went to Samuel Golding in the hospital, nursed him there, and when he came out, married and lived with him for twenty years; he had a pension from Chelsea. After Golding’s death, she married Hessel, has had many children, and has been many years a widow. Her eldest son was a sailor with Admiral Norris; he afterwards went to the East Indies, and, if he is now alive, must be nearly seventy years of age. The rest of the family are dead. At an advanced age she earned a scanty livelihood at Brighton by selling apples and gingerbread on the Marine Parade. “I saw this woman to-day in her bed, to which she is confined from having lost the use of her limbs. She has even now, old and withered as she is, a characteristic countenance, and, I should judge from her present appearance, must have had a fine, though perhaps a masculine style of head when young. I have seen many a woman at the age of sixty or seventy look older than she does under the load of 108 years of human life. Her cheeks are round and seem firm, though ploughed with many a small wrinkle. Her eyes, though their sight is gone, are large and well formed. As soon as it was announced that somebody had come to see her, she broke the silence of her solitary thoughts and spoke. She began in a complaining tone, as if the remains of a strong and restless spirit were impatient of the prison of a decaying and weak body. ‘Other people die, and I cannot,’ she said. Upon exciting her recollection of former days, her energy seemed roused, and she spoke with emphasis. Her voice was strong for an old person; and I could easily believe her when, upon being asked if her sex was not in danger of being detected by her voice, she replied that she always had a strong and manly voice. She appeared to take a pride in having kept her secret, declaring that she told it to no man, woman, or child, during the time she was in the army; ‘for you know, Sir, a drunken man and a child always tell the truth. But,’ said she, ‘I told my secret to the ground. I dug a hole that would hold a gallon, and whispered it there.’ While I was with her, the flies annoyed her extremely; she drove them away with a fan, and said they seemed to smell her out as one that was going to the grave. She showed me a wound she had received in her elbow by a bayonet. She lamented the error of her former ways, but excused it by saying, ‘When you are at Rome, you must do as Rome does.’ When she could not distinctly hear what was said, she raised herself in the bed and thrust her head forward with impatient energy. She said when the king saw her, he called her ‘a jolly old fellow.’ Though blind, she could discern a glimmering light, and I was told would frequently state the time of day by the effect of light.” The next is copied from a time-worn stone in Weem churchyard, near Aberfeldy, Perthshire:— In memory of Captain James Carmichael, of Bockland’s Regiment.—Died 25th Nov. 1758: Where now, O Son of Mars, is Honour’s aim?
What once thou wast or wished, no more’s thy claim.
Thy tomb, Carmichael, tells thy Honour’s Roll,
And man is born, as thee, to be forgot.
But virtue lives to glaze thy honours o’er,
And Heaven will smile when brittle stone’s no more. | The following is inscribed on a gravestone in Fort William Cemetery:— Sacred
To the Memory of
Captain Patrick Campbell,
Late of the 42nd Regiment,
Who died on the xiii of December,
MDCCCXVI.,
Aged eighty-three years,
A True Highlander,
A Sincere Friend,
And the best deerstalker
Of his day. A gravestone in Barwick-in-Elmet, Yorkshire, states:— Here lies, retired from busy scenes,
A first lieutenant of Marines,
Who lately lived in gay content
On board the brave ship “Diligent.”
Now stripp’d of all his warlike show,
And laid in box of elm below,
Confined in earth in narrow borders,
He rises not till further orders. | The next is from Dartmouth churchyard:— Thomas Goldsmith, who died 1714. He commanded the “Snap Dragon,” as Privateer belonging to this port, in the reign of Queen Anne, in which vessel he turned pirate, and amass’d much riches. Men that are virtuous serve the Lord;
And the Devil’s by his friends ador’d;
And as they merit get a place
Amidst the bless’d or hellish race;
Pray then, ye learned clergy show
Where can this brute, Tom Goldsmith, go?
Whose life was one continued evil,
Striving to cheat God, Man, and Devil. | We find the following at Woodbridge on Joseph Spalding, master mariner, who departed this life Sept. 2nd, 1796, aged 55:— Embark’d in life’s tempestuous sea, we steer
’Midst threatening billows, rocks and shoals;
But Christ by faith, dispels each wavering fear,
And safe secures the anchor of our souls. | In Selby churchyard, the following is on John Edmonds, master mariner, who died 5th Aug., 1767:— Tho’ Boreas, with his blustering blasts
Has tost me to and fro,
Yet by the handiwork of God,
I’m here enclosed below.
And in this silent bay I lie
With many of our fleet,
Until the day that I set sail
My Saviour Christ to meet. | Another, on the south side of Selby churchyard:— The boisterous main I’ve travers’d o’er,
New seas and lands explored,
But now at last, I’m anchor’d fast,
In peace and silence moor’d. | In the churchyard, Selby, near the north porch, in memory of William Whittaker, mariner, who died 22nd Oct., 1797, we read— Oft time in danger have I been
Upon the raging main,
But here in harbour safe at rest
Free from all human pain. | Southill Church, Bedfordshire, contains a plain monument to the memory of Admiral Byng, who was shot at Portsmouth:— To the perpetual disgrace of public justice,
The Honourable John Byng, Vice-Admiral of the Blue,
fell a martyr to political persecution, March 14,
in the year 1757;
when bravery and loyalty were insufficient securities for
the life and honour of a naval officer. The following epitaph, inscribed on a stone in Putney churchyard, is nearly obliterated:— Lieut. Alex. Davidson
Royal Navy has Caus’d this Stone
to be Erected to the Memory of
Harriot his dearly beloved Wife
who departed this Life Jan 24 1808
Aged 38 Years. | I have crossed this Earth’s Equator Just sixteen times
And in my Country’s cause have brav’d far distant climes
In Howe’s Trafalgar and several Victories more
Firm and unmov’d I heard the Fatal Cannons roar
Trampling in human blood I felt not any fear
Nor for my Slaughter’d gallant Messmates shed A tear
But of A dear Wife by Death unhappily beguil’d
Even the British Sailor must become A child
Yet when from this Earth God shall my soul unfetter
I hope we’ll meet in Another World and a better. | Some time ago a correspondent of the Spectator stated: “As you are not one to despise ‘unconsidered trifles’ when they have merit, perhaps you will find room for the following epitaph, on a Deal boatman, which I copied the other day from a tombstone in a churchyard in that town:— In memory of George Phillpot,
Who died March 22nd, 1850, aged 74 years. Full many a life he saved
With his undaunted crew;
He put his trust in Providence,
And cared not how it blew. | A hero; his heroic life and deeds, and the philosophy of religion, perfect both in theory and practice, which inspired them, all described in four lines of graphic and spirited verse! Would not ‘rare Ben’ himself have acknowledged this a good specimen of ‘what verse can say in a little?’ Whoever wrote it was a poet ‘with the name.’ “There is another in the same churchyard which, though weak after the above, and indeed not uncommon, I fancy, in seaside towns, is at least sufficiently quaint:— Memory of James Epps Buttress, who, in rendering assistance to the French Schooner, “Vesuvienne,” was drowned, December 27th, 1852, aged 39. Though Boreas’ blast and Neptune’s wave
Did toss me to and fro,
In spite of both, by God’s decree,
I harbour here below;
And here I do at anchor ride
With many of our fleet,
Yet once again I must set sail,
Our Admiral, Christ, to meet.
Also two sons, who died in infancy, &c. The ‘human race’ typified by ‘our fleet,’ excites vague reminiscences of Goethe and Carlyle, and ‘our Admiral Christ’ seems not remotely associated in sentiment with the ‘We fight that fight for our fair father Christ,’ and ‘The King will follow Christ and we the King,’ of our grand poet. So do the highest and the lowest meet. But the heartiness, the vitality, nay, almost vivacity, of some of these underground tenantry is surprising. There is more life in some of our dead folk than in many a living crowd.” The following five epitaphs are from Hessle Road Cemetery, Hull:— William Easton,
Who was lost at sea,
In the fishing smack Martha,
In the gale of January, 1865.
Aged 30 years. | When through the torn sail the wild tempest is streaming;
When o’er the dark wave the red lightning is gleaming,
No hope lends a ray the poor fisher to cherish.
Oh hear, kind Jesus; save, Lord, or we perish! | In affectionate remembrance of
Thomas Crackles,
Humber Pilot, who was drowned off
The Lincolnshire Coast,
During the gale, October 19th, 1869.
Aged 24 years. | How swift the torrent rolls
That hastens to the sea;
How strong the tide that bears our souls
On to Eternity. | In affectionate remembrance of
David Collison,
Who was drowned in the “Spirit of the Age,”
Off Scarborough, Jan. 6th, 1864.
Aged 36 years. |
I cannot bend over his grave,
He sleeps in the secret sea;
And not one gentle whisp’red wave
Can tell that place to me.
Although unseen by human eyes,
And mortal know’d it not;
Yet Christ knows where his body lies,
And angels guard the spot. | Robert Pickering, who was
Drowned from the smack “Satisfaction,”
On the Dutch coast, May 7, 1869.
Aged 18 years. | The waters flowed on every side,
No chance was there to save;
At last compelled, he bowed and died,
And found a watery grave. | In affectionate remembrance of
William Harrison,
53 years Mariner of Hull,
Who died October 5th, 1864.
Aged 70 years. | Long time I ploughed the ocean wide,
A life of toil I spent;
But now in harbour safe arrived
From care and discontent.
My anchor’s cast, my sails are furled,
And now I am at rest.
Of all the parts throughout the world,
Sailors, this is the best. | Our next example is from a stone in Castle Street burial-ground, Hull, which is so fast decaying that already some parts of the inscription are obliterated:— Sacred
to the memory
of
William Walker,
. . . . . r of the Sloop Janatt,
. . . . . . . who was unfortunately
drowned off Flamborough Head,
17th April, 1823.
Aged 41 years.
This stone was Erected by
his Countrymen in
remembrance of his Death. | I have left the troubled ocean,
And now laid down to sleep,
In hopes I shall set sail
Our Saviour Christ to meet. | A gravestone in Horncastle churchyard, Lincolnshire, has this epitaph:— My helm was gone,
My sails were rent,
My mast went by the board,
My hull it struck upon a rock,
Receive my soul, O Lord! | On a sailor’s gravestone in the burial-ground at Hamilton, we are told:— The seas he ploughed for twenty years,
Without the smallest dread or fears:
And all that time was never known
To strike upon a bank or stone. |
|
  |
