Curious Epitaphs Part 20

[Ill.u.s.tration: ETTY'S GRAVE.]

Fairholt, in his "Homes, Works, and Shrines of English Artists"[3] gives an interesting sketch of the career of William Etty, the son of a miller, who for seven years was an apprentice to a printer in Hull, but devoted all his spare time to art, and eventually after many struggles won a high place amongst the painters of the period. He was buried in the churchyard of St. Olave, York, where from the beautiful grounds of the Yorkshire Philosophical Society, and through one of the arches of the ruined Abbey of St. Mary, his tomb may be seen. The arch near his grave was closed, but was opened to bring in sight his tomb. Mr. Fairholt is in error in saying it bears the simple inscription:--

WILLIAM ETTY, ROYAL ACADEMICIAN.

Some years ago from the other side of the tomb we copied the following inscription from a crumbling stone:--

WILLIAM ETTY, ROYAL ACADEMICIAN, Who in his brilliant works has left an enduring monument of his exalted genius.

Earnestly aiming to attain that lofty position on which his highly gifted talents have placed him, he throughout life exhibited an undeviating perseverance in his profession.

To promote its advancement in his beloved country he watched the progress of those engaged in its study with the most disinterested kindness.

To a cultivated and highly poetical mind Were united a cheerfulness and sweetness of disposition With great simplicity and urbanity of manners.

He was richly endeared to all who knew him.

His piety was unaffected, his faith in Christ sincere, and his devotion to G.o.d exemplary.

He was born at York, March 10th, 1787, and died in his native city, November 13th, 1849.

"Why seek ye the living among the dead?"--Luke xxii., 5.

Etty, says Fairholt, had that wisdom which few men possess, the wisdom of a contented mind. He loved his quiet home, in his provincial birthplace, better than the bustle of London, or the notoriety he might obtain by a residence there. His character and his talent would ensure him attention and deference anywhere, but he preferred his own nook by the old church at York. He probably felt with the poet, that

"The wind is strongest on the highest hills, The quiet life is in the vale below."

The remains of Cruikshank rest in the crypt in St. Paul's Cathedral, London, and over his grave the following inscription appears:--

GEORGE CRUIKSHANK, Artist, Designer, Etcher, Painter.

Born at No. -- Duke Street, St. George's, Bloomsbury, London on September 27th, 1792.

Died at 263, Hampstead Road, St. Pancras, London, on February 1st, 1878.

Aged 86 years.

In memory of his Genius and his Art, His matchless Industry and worthy Work For all his fellow-men, This monument Is humbly placed within this sacred Fane By her who loved him best, his widowed wife.

Eliza Cruikshank, Feb. 9th, 1880.

A sketch of his life has been written by Walter Hamilton, under the t.i.tle of "George Cruikshank, Artist and Humourist." (London: Elliot Stock, 1878.) William Bates, B.A., M.R.C.S., wrote "George Cruikshank, the Artist, the Humourist, and the Man, with Some Account of his Brother Robert." (Birmingham: Houghton & Hammond, 1878.) Blanchard Jerrold wrote "The Life of George Cruikshank." (London: Chatto & Windus, a new edition with eighty-four ill.u.s.trations, 1883.) An able article contributed to the _Westminster Review_, by William Makepeace Thackeray, has been reproduced in book form by George Redway, London (1884). Some time ago the following appeared in a newspaper:--One day while Dr. B. W. Richardson was engaged at his house with an old patient who had been away many years in India, George Cruikshank's card was handed to the doctor. "It must be the grandson, or the son, at any rate, of the great artist I remember as a boy," said the patient. "It is impossible that George Cruikshank of Queen Caroline's trial-time can be alive!" The doctor asked the vivacious George to come in. He tripped in, in his eighty-fourth year, and, when the old officer expressed his astonishment, George exclaimed, "I'll show you whether he is alive!" With this he took the poker and tongs from the grate, laid them upon the carpet, and executed the sword dance before Dr.

Richardson's astonished patient.

At the east end of the High Street, Portsmouth, and nearly opposite the house before which the Duke of Buckingham was stabbed by Felton, in 1628, stands the Unitarian Chapel. John Pounds habitually worshipped here on a Sunday evening, and the place where he used to sit, in front of one of the side galleries, just to the right of the minister, is still pointed out.

He lies buried in the graveyard, on the left-hand side of the chapel, near the end of the little foot-path which leads round the building to the vestries. Shortly after his death a tablet was placed in the chapel, beneath the gallery, to his memory. Although his grave was dug as near as possible to that part of the chapel wall opposite where he used to sit, yet this tablet was, apparently without any reason, put some distance away from the spot. In shape and material it is of the usual orthodox style--a square slab of white marble, edged with black, and inscribed on it are the words:--

Erected by friends as a memorial of their esteem and respect for JOHN POUNDS, who, while earning his livelihood by mending shoes, gratuitously educated, and in part clothed and fed, some hundreds of poor children.

He died suddenly on the 1st of January, 1839, aged 72 years.

Thou shalt be blessed: for they cannot recompense thee.

Not long after this tablet was placed in position the idea was mooted that a monument should be erected over his grave. The Rev. Henry Hawkes, the minister who then had charge of the place, at once took the matter up, and subscriptions came in so well that the monument was more than paid for.

The surplus money was wisely laid out in the purchase of a Memorial Library, which still occupies one of the ante-rooms of the chapel. The monument erected over the grave is of a suitable description, plain but substantial, and is in form a square and somewhat tapering block of stone about four feet high. On the front is the following inscription:--

Underneath this Monument rest the mortal remains of JOHN POUNDS, the Philanthropic Shoemaker of St. Mary's Street, Portsmouth, who while working at his trade in a very small room, gratuitously instructed in a useful education and partly clothed and fed, some hundreds of girls and boys.

He died suddenly, on New Year's Day, MDCCCx.x.xIX, while in his active beneficence, aged LXXII years.

"Well done thou good and faithful servant, enter thou into the joy of thy Lord."

"Verily I say unto thee, inasmuch as thou hast done it unto one of the least of these My brethren, thou hast done it unto Me."

On the side facing the library door there are, in addition to the above, the ensuing sentences:--

This Monument has been erected chiefly by means of Penny Subscriptions, not only from the Christian Brotherhood with whom JOHN POUNDS habitually worshipped in the adjoining Chapel, but from persons of widely different Religious opinions throughout Great Britain and from the most distant parts of the World.

In connection with this memorial has also been founded in like manner within these precincts a Library to his memory designed to extend to an indefinite futurity the solid mental and moral usefulness to which the philanthropic shoemaker was so earnestly devoted to the last day of his life.

Pray for the blessing of G.o.d to prosper it.

Large trees overshade the modest monument, and the spot is a quiet one, being as far as possible away from the street.[4]

On the gravestone of Richard Turner, Preston, a hawker of fish, the following inscription appears:

Beneath this stone are deposited the remains of RICHARD TURNER, author of the word Teetotal, as applied to abstinence from all intoxicating liquors, who departed this life on the 27th day of October, 1846, aged 56 years.

In Mr. W. E. A. Axon's able and entertaining volume, "Lancashire Gleanings" (pub. 1883), is an interesting chapter on the "Origin of the Word 'Teetotal.'" In the same work we are told that Dr. Whitaker, the historian of Whalley, wrote the following epitaph on a model publican:--

Here lies the Body of JOHN WIGGLESWORTH, More than fifty years he was the perpetual Innkeeper in this Town.

Withstanding the temptations of that dangerous calling, he maintained good order in his House, kept the Sabbath day Holy, frequented the Public Worship with his Family, induced his guests to do the same, and regularly partook of the Holy Communion.

He was also bountiful to the Poor, in private as well as in public, and, by the blessings of Providence on a life so spent, died possessed of competent Wealth, Feb. 28, 1813, aged 77 years.

The churchyard of Sutton Coldfield, Warwickshire, contains a gravestone bearing an inscription as follows:--

As a warning to female virtue, And a humble monument of female chast.i.ty, This stone marks the grave of MARY ASHFORD, Who, in the 20th year of her age, having Incautiously repaired to a scene of amus.e.m.e.nt, Was brutally violated and murdered On the 27th of May, 1817.

Lovely and chaste as the primrose pale, Rifled of virgin sweetness by the gale, Mary! the wretch who thee remorseless slew Avenging wrath, who sleeps not, will pursue; For though the deed of blood was veiled in night, Will not the Judge of all mankind do right?

Fair blighted flower, the muse that weeps thy doom, Rears o'er thy murdered form this warning tomb.

The writer of the foregoing epitaph was Dr. Booker, vicar of Dudley. The inscription is a.s.sociated with one of the most remarkable trials of the present century. It will not be without interest to furnish a few notes on the case. One Abraham Thornton was tried at the Warwick a.s.sizes for the murder of Mary Ashford, and acquitted. The brother and next of kin of the deceased, not being satisfied with the verdict, sued out, as the law allowed him, an appeal against Thornton, by which he could be put on his trial again. The law allowed the appeal in case of murder, and it also gave option to the accused of having it tried by wager of law or by wager of battle. The brother of the unfortunate woman had taken no account of this, and accordingly, not only Mr. Ashford but the judge, jury, and bar were taken greatly aback, and stricken with dismay, when the accused, being requested to plead, took a paper from Mr. Reader, his counsel, and a pair of gloves, one of which he drew on, and, throwing the other on the ground, exclaimed, "Not guilty; and I am ready to defend the same with my body!" Lord Ellenborough on the bench appeared grave, and the accuser looked amazed, so the court was adjourned to enable the judge to have an opportunity of conferring with his learned brethren. After several adjournments, Lord Ellenborough at last declared solemnly, but reluctantly, that wager of battle was still the law of the land, and that the accused had a right of appeal to it. To get rid of the law an attempt was made, by pa.s.sing a short and speedy Act of Parliament, but this was ruled impossible, as it would have been _ex post facto_, and people waited curiously to see the lists set up in the Tothill Fields. As Mr. Ashford refused to meet Thornton, he was obliged to cry "craven!" After that the appellor was allowed to go at large, and he could not be again tried by wager of law after having claimed his wager of battle. In 1819 an Act was pa.s.sed to prevent any further appeals for wager of battle.

The following is from a gravestone in Saddleworth churchyard, and tells a painful story:--

Here lie interred the dreadfully bruised and lacerated bodies of WILLIAM BRADBURY and THOMAS his son, both of Greenfield, who were together savagely murdered, in an unusually horrible manner, on Monday night, April 2nd, 1832, old William being 84, and Thomas 46 years old.

Throughout the land, wherever news is read, Intelligence of their sad death has spread; Those now who talk of far-fam'd Greenfield's hills Will think of Bill o' Jacks and Tom o' Bills.

Such interest did their tragic end excite That, ere they were removed from human sight, Thousands upon thousands daily came to see The b.l.o.o.d.y scene of the catastrophe.

One house, one business, and one bed, And one most shocking death they had; One funeral came, one inquest pa.s.s'd, And now one grave they have at last.

The following on a Hull character is from South Cave churchyard:--

In memory of THOMAS SCRATCHARD, Who dy'd rich in friends, Dec. 10, 1809.

Aged 58 years.

That Ann lov'd Tom, is very true, Perhaps you'll say, what's that to you.

Who e'er thou art, remember this, Tom lov'd Ann, 'twas that made bliss.

In Welton churchyard, near Hull, the next curious inscription appears on an old gravestone:--