Unknown Sailor
Encyclopedia
The Unknown Sailor was an anonymous seafarer murdered in September 1786 at Hindhead
in Surrey, England. His murderers were hanged in chains on Gibbet Hill, Hindhead
the following year.
as he was walking back from London
to join his ship at Portsmouth
on September 24, 1786. There he met three other seafarers, James Marshall, Michael Casey and Edward Lonegon. He generously paid for their drinks and food and was last seen leaving for Hindhead Hill with them. The three seafarers murdered him and stripped him of his clothes. The three then made their way down the London to Portsmouth road (now the A3
) and were arrested a few hours later trying to sell the murdered sailor's clothes at the Sun Inn in Rake
(not the Flying Bull in Rake as some versions of the story have it).
The Hampshire Chronicle, dated 2nd October 1786, reads:
Six months later they were tried at Kingston
assizes and two days after that, on Saturday 7 April 1787, they were hanged in chains on a triple gibbet close to the scene of the crime in Hindhead.
churchyard and the gravestone was paid for by the residents of the village.(Moorey 2000: p. 1)
It reads:
The gravestone is a Grade-1 listed structure and has recently (2010) been "cleaned and refreshed".
The inscription on the back of the stone reads:
When the London to Portsmouth road was lowered to its present location in 1826 the stone was removed and placed alongside the Punch Bowl bend. It was then removed back to its original location (and the curse on the back of the stone added). The stone was then returned down to the Punch Bowl road. Finally the stone was moved again in 1932 back to its original location when the main road was widened.(Moorey 2000: p. 3)
The latitude
and longitude
of the Sailor’s Stone are 51°06′52.5"N 0°43′6.9"W.
paid for the erection of a granite Iona Cross on Gibbet Hill on the site of the scaffold. He did this to dispel the fears and superstitions of local people and to raise their spirits.(Moorey. 2000: p. 1)
The cross has four Latin inscriptions around its base. They read:
which translate to “Light after darkness. Peace in passing away. Hope in light. Salvation after death."
The latitude
and longitude
of the Iona Cross are 51° 06’ 56.1”N, 0° 42’ 58.2”W.
of Selborne
records, in his Naturalist's Journal 1768-1793, that on December 23, 1790 there was a terrible thunderstorm during which:
created a collection of 71 Mezzotint
s under the title Liber Studiorum. These were published in 1811. One of these (number 25) was of Hindhead Hill with the gibbet clearly shown:
The verses include the lines "Hind head thou cloud capt hill" and "Hark the kreaking Irons. Hark the screaching owl" (Moorey 2000: p. 8)
mentions the murder of the Unknown Sailor in Chapter 22 of his novel Nicholas Nickleby published in 1838-9:
became inhabited by several families who enclosed for themselves portions of the western slopes of the Bowl. Here they pastured their sheep, goats and cattle, and added to their earnings the profits of a trade they monopolised: that of making and selling brooms. Rods supplied by coppices of Spanish chestnut served for handles, the long and wiry heather twigs for brush. They became known as the Broom-squires
and were a fiercely independent folk. The chief Broom-squire families were the Boxalls, the Snellings and the Nashes. In 1896 the Reverend Sabine Baring-Gould
published his novel The Broom-Squire which tells the fictitious tragic story of Mehetabel, supposedly the daughter of the Unknown Sailor, and of her ill-treatment at the hands of Bideabout, one of the Broom-squires.
by Monica Edwards
features the story of the Unknown Sailor and the Sailor's Stone. One of the characters, Tamzin Grey, believes that she has been cursed because she scratched her initials on the stone with a penknife.
, London.
Hindhead
Hindhead is a village in Surrey, England, about 11 miles south-west of Guildford. Neighbouring settlements include Haslemere, Grayshott and Beacon Hill. Hindhead is the highest village in Surrey...
in Surrey, England. His murderers were hanged in chains on Gibbet Hill, Hindhead
Gibbet Hill, Hindhead
Gibbet Hill, at Hindhead, Surrey, is a hill above the Devil's Punch Bowl, not far from the A3 London to Portsmouth road in England. It is the second highest point in Surrey after Leith Hill....
the following year.
Murder
The Unknown Sailor is first recorded as visiting the Red Lion Inn at ThursleyThursley
Thursley is a small village in Surrey. It lies just west of the A3 running between Milford and Hindhead. Neighbouring villages include Rushmoor, Bowlhead Green and Brook. Thursley is in south-west Surrey, in south-east England...
as he was walking back from London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
to join his ship at Portsmouth
Portsmouth
Portsmouth is the second largest city in the ceremonial county of Hampshire on the south coast of England. Portsmouth is notable for being the United Kingdom's only island city; it is located mainly on Portsea Island...
on September 24, 1786. There he met three other seafarers, James Marshall, Michael Casey and Edward Lonegon. He generously paid for their drinks and food and was last seen leaving for Hindhead Hill with them. The three seafarers murdered him and stripped him of his clothes. The three then made their way down the London to Portsmouth road (now the A3
A3 road
The A3, known as the Portsmouth Road for much of its length, is a dual carriageway, or expressway, which follows the historic route between London and Portsmouth passing close to Kingston upon Thames, Guildford, Haslemere and Petersfield. For much of its length, it is classified as a trunk road...
) and were arrested a few hours later trying to sell the murdered sailor's clothes at the Sun Inn in Rake
Rake, West Sussex
Rake is a linear village in the English county of West Sussex.Historically its importance rose from it being on the main London-Portsmouth road but it has been bypassed for several years. Administratively Rake forms part of the civil parish of Rogate; in turn Rogate forms part of the district of...
(not the Flying Bull in Rake as some versions of the story have it).
The Hampshire Chronicle, dated 2nd October 1786, reads:
Sunday last a shocking murder was committed by three sailors, on one
of their companions, a seaman also, between Godalming --- They nearly severed
his head from his body, stripped him quite naked, and threw him into a valley,
where he was providentially discovered, soon after the perpetration of the horrid
crime, by some countrymen corning over Hind Head, who immediately gave the
alarm, when the desperadoes were instantly pursued, and overtaken at the house
of Mr. Adams, the Sun, at Rake. They were properly secured, and are since
lodged in gaol, to take their trials at the next assizes for the county of Surrey.
Six months later they were tried at Kingston
Kingston upon Thames
Kingston upon Thames is the principal settlement of the Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames in southwest London. It was the ancient market town where Saxon kings were crowned and is now a suburb situated south west of Charing Cross. It is one of the major metropolitan centres identified in the...
assizes and two days after that, on Saturday 7 April 1787, they were hanged in chains on a triple gibbet close to the scene of the crime in Hindhead.
Memorials
Gravestone
The unknown sailor was buried in ThursleyThursley
Thursley is a small village in Surrey. It lies just west of the A3 running between Milford and Hindhead. Neighbouring villages include Rushmoor, Bowlhead Green and Brook. Thursley is in south-west Surrey, in south-east England...
churchyard and the gravestone was paid for by the residents of the village.(Moorey 2000: p. 1)
It reads:
In memory of
A generous but unfortunate Sailor
Who was barbarously murder'd on Hindhead
On September 24th 1786
By three Villains
After he had liberally treated them
And promised them his farther assistance
On the road to Portsmouth.
The gravestone is a Grade-1 listed structure and has recently (2010) been "cleaned and refreshed".
Sailor's Stone
The Sailor's Stone was erected by James Stillwell of nearby Cosford Mill soon after the murder. It was sited on the Old Coaching Road from London to Portsmouth close to the site of the murder. The inscription on the front of the stone reads:
ERECTED
In detestation of a barbarous Murder
Committed here on an unknown Sailor
On Sep, 24th 1786
By Edwd. Lonegon, Mich. Casey & Jas. Marshall
Who were all taken the same day
And hung in Chains near this place
Whoso sheddeth Man's Blood by Man shall his
Blood be shed. Gen Chap 9 Ver 6
[NB the following part of the inscription was clearly added at a later date]
See the back of this stone
THIS STONE WAS ERECTED
A.D. 1786 BY JAMES STILLWELL ESQRE. OF COSFORD
AND WAS RENOVATED SEP 24TH 1889 BY
JAMES JOHN RUSSELL STILLWELL ESQRE OF KILLINGHURST
THE DESCENDANT AND REPRESENTATIVE OF THE STILLWELLS
OF COSFORD AND MOUSHILL
The inscription on the back of the stone reads:
THIS STONE
was Erected
by order and at
the cost of
James Stilwell Esqr.
of
Cosford
1786
Cursed be the Man who injureth
or removeth this Stone
When the London to Portsmouth road was lowered to its present location in 1826 the stone was removed and placed alongside the Punch Bowl bend. It was then removed back to its original location (and the curse on the back of the stone added). The stone was then returned down to the Punch Bowl road. Finally the stone was moved again in 1932 back to its original location when the main road was widened.(Moorey 2000: p. 3)
The latitude
Latitude
In geography, the latitude of a location on the Earth is the angular distance of that location south or north of the Equator. The latitude is an angle, and is usually measured in degrees . The equator has a latitude of 0°, the North pole has a latitude of 90° north , and the South pole has a...
and longitude
Longitude
Longitude is a geographic coordinate that specifies the east-west position of a point on the Earth's surface. It is an angular measurement, usually expressed in degrees, minutes and seconds, and denoted by the Greek letter lambda ....
of the Sailor’s Stone are 51°06′52.5"N 0°43′6.9"W.
Iona Cross
In 1851 Sir William ErleWilliam Erle
Sir William Erle PC QC FRS was an English lawyer, judge and Whig politician.-Early career:Born at Fifehead Magdalen, Dorset, William was the son of the Rev. Christopher Erle of Gillingham, Dorset and Margaret née Bowles, a relative of the poet William Lisle Bowles. His younger brother Peter Erle...
paid for the erection of a granite Iona Cross on Gibbet Hill on the site of the scaffold. He did this to dispel the fears and superstitions of local people and to raise their spirits.(Moorey. 2000: p. 1)
The cross has four Latin inscriptions around its base. They read:
POST TENEBRAS LUX
IN OBITU PAX
IN LUCE SPES
POST OBITUM SALUS
which translate to “Light after darkness. Peace in passing away. Hope in light. Salvation after death."
The latitude
Latitude
In geography, the latitude of a location on the Earth is the angular distance of that location south or north of the Equator. The latitude is an angle, and is usually measured in degrees . The equator has a latitude of 0°, the North pole has a latitude of 90° north , and the South pole has a...
and longitude
Longitude
Longitude is a geographic coordinate that specifies the east-west position of a point on the Earth's surface. It is an angular measurement, usually expressed in degrees, minutes and seconds, and denoted by the Greek letter lambda ....
of the Iona Cross are 51° 06’ 56.1”N, 0° 42’ 58.2”W.
Gilbert White
Gilbert WhiteGilbert White
Gilbert White FRS was a pioneering English naturalist and ornithologist.-Life:White was born in his grandfather's vicarage at Selborne in Hampshire. He was educated at the Holy Ghost School and by a private tutor in Basingstoke before going to Oriel College, Oxford...
of Selborne
Selborne
Selborne is a village in the East Hampshire district of Hampshire, England. It is south of Alton. It will be just within the extreme northern boundary of the proposed South Downs National Park, which is due to take effect in mid-2010....
records, in his Naturalist's Journal 1768-1793, that on December 23, 1790 there was a terrible thunderstorm during which:
Two men were struck dead in a wind-mill near Rooks-hill on the Sussex downs: & on Hind-head one of the bodies on the gibbet was beaten down to the ground.
Turner's Liber Studiorum
Between 1807 and 1809 the painter TurnerJ. M. W. Turner
Joseph Mallord William Turner RA was an English Romantic landscape painter, watercolourist and printmaker. Turner was considered a controversial figure in his day, but is now regarded as the artist who elevated landscape painting to an eminence rivalling history painting...
created a collection of 71 Mezzotint
Mezzotint
Mezzotint is a printmaking process of the intaglio family, technically a drypoint method. It was the first tonal method to be used, enabling half-tones to be produced without using line- or dot-based techniques like hatching, cross-hatching or stipple...
s under the title Liber Studiorum. These were published in 1811. One of these (number 25) was of Hindhead Hill with the gibbet clearly shown:
On his return to London from Spithead in the winter of 1807 Turner was stimulated by the grisly associations of the place to compose some fragmentary verses, and when he made his preliminary drawing for his Liber plate he carefully delineated the forms of the three bodies on the gallows in allusion to the events of 1787. He reworked the outline of the gibbet in drypoint... so that it resembles a serif letter 'T'. Turner enjoyed visual punning and he may have intended the form to represent a macabre allusion to his own initial.
The verses include the lines "Hind head thou cloud capt hill" and "Hark the kreaking Irons. Hark the screaching owl" (Moorey 2000: p. 8)
Nicholas Nickleby
Charles DickensCharles Dickens
Charles John Huffam Dickens was an English novelist, generally considered the greatest of the Victorian period. Dickens enjoyed a wider popularity and fame than had any previous author during his lifetime, and he remains popular, having been responsible for some of English literature's most iconic...
mentions the murder of the Unknown Sailor in Chapter 22 of his novel Nicholas Nickleby published in 1838-9:
They [Nicholas Nickleby and Smike] walked upon the rim of the Devil's Punch Bowl; and Smike listened with greedy interest as Nicholas read the inscription upon the stone which, reared upon that wild spot, tells of a murder committed there by night. The grass on which they stood, had once been dyed with gore; and the blood of the murdered man had run down, drop by drop, into the hollow which gives the place its name. 'The Devil's Bowl,' thought Nicholas, as he looked into the void, 'never held fitter liquor than that!'
The Broom-squire
In the early nineteenth century the Devil's Punch BowlDevil's Punch Bowl
The Devil's Punch Bowl is a large natural amphitheatre and beauty spot near Hindhead, Surrey, in England, and is the source of many stories about the area. The London to Portsmouth road used to climb round its side, but this is now closed due to the Hindhead Tunnel opening on the 27th July 2011...
became inhabited by several families who enclosed for themselves portions of the western slopes of the Bowl. Here they pastured their sheep, goats and cattle, and added to their earnings the profits of a trade they monopolised: that of making and selling brooms. Rods supplied by coppices of Spanish chestnut served for handles, the long and wiry heather twigs for brush. They became known as the Broom-squires
Broomsquire
A broomsquire is someone who makes besom brooms for a living. It is a trade that was historically usually unique to heathland areas of England. The broomsquire tended to use heather or birch twigs gathered from the heathland to make the brooms. They also grazed cattle or sheep on the poor vegetation...
and were a fiercely independent folk. The chief Broom-squire families were the Boxalls, the Snellings and the Nashes. In 1896 the Reverend Sabine Baring-Gould
Sabine Baring-Gould
The Reverend Sabine Baring-Gould was an English hagiographer, antiquarian, novelist and eclectic scholar. His bibliography consists of more than 1240 publications, though this list continues to grow. His family home, Lew Trenchard Manor near Okehampton, Devon, has been preserved as he had it...
published his novel The Broom-Squire which tells the fictitious tragic story of Mehetabel, supposedly the daughter of the Unknown Sailor, and of her ill-treatment at the hands of Bideabout, one of the Broom-squires.
Punchbowl Midnight
The 1951 children's novel Punchbowl MidnightPunchbowl Midnight
Black Hunting Whip is the second book in the Punchbowl Farm series of novels by Monica Edwards, published in 1951 by Collins. The book was illustrated by the eminent wild-life artist Charles Tunnicliffe. Tamzin, from the Romney Marsh series, meets Lindsey Thornton while stalking wild deer in the...
by Monica Edwards
Monica Edwards
Monica Edwards was an English children's writer of the mid-twentieth century best known for her Romney Marsh and Punchbowl Farm series of children's novels.-Early life:...
features the story of the Unknown Sailor and the Sailor's Stone. One of the characters, Tamzin Grey, believes that she has been cursed because she scratched her initials on the stone with a penknife.
"It was for his money they did it, of course," Lindsey said. "And there's a curse, you know."
"What sort of curse?"
"Someone put a stone where the crime was committed and it says on it, 'Cursed be the man who injureth or moveth this stone.'"...
"Lindsey, are you sure it says 'injureth' as well as 'moveth'?"
"Of course. Why?"
"Well, it's a pretty slender outlook for me, then. I found the stone two days ago and I scratched my initials on it with the marline spike of my knife. Funny thing, I didn't notice any curse at all."
"It's on the back of the stone," said Lindsey.
Identity
In his book Who was the Sailor murdered at Hindhead 1786, published in 2000, Peter Moorey argues the case for the identity of the Unknown Sailor being Edward Hardman, born in 1752 in LambethLambeth
Lambeth is a district of south London, England, and part of the London Borough of Lambeth. It is situated southeast of Charing Cross.-Toponymy:...
, London.