One of my favourite authors is Joseph Conrad and being over in Kent with a car rather than by water aboard Whimbrel, I looked up where he was buried after his death in August 1924. I had been given a biography of Conrad’s life written in the context of the age he lived in – during the great growth of the British Empire and its probable peak.
I have ‘consumed’ many of Conrad’s works and some have been read and re-read – Mirror of the Sea, Secret Agent and Heart of Darkness are three favourites. But others have enthralled too. The aforementioned have the Thames, in Sea Reach, and London in their make up, which adds to their allure. I am now on a collecting ‘spree’ fuelled by my dear wife to obtain a larger collection…
Anyway, we were celebrating our 40th Wedding Anniversary and Christobel came up with the idea of ‘popping’ over to Faversham and staying at The Red Sails Hotel – good food. Lovely town. We’re off elsewhere too… I’d read that Conrad’s final home was just a few miles from Canterbury and Faversham is close by. A quick search revealed the whereabouts of Conrad’s grave – The Canterbury Cemetery, Harbledown, on the Faversham side of Canterbury.
Arriving outside the cemetery we parked up and ambled in. It was a grey day, a typical thick day at sea sort of day, with a little drizzle. Seeing some lights at a little stone building some distance from the cemetery’s church, we made our way along a well made up pathway and knocked. A voice called us in … I got to about half way through asking about Conrad’s grave site and a young gardener/grounds man got up and said, ‘follow me … we get lots of people asking…’!
The chap set off, at a pace, the Mate, in her ‘clip-clop’ heels strode along beside me, skipping as the passage took across not so firm grass!
Then there it was, an obelisk of hewn stone … commemorating Conrad and his wife, Jessie.
Joseph and Jessie Conrad’s grave stone.
The stone has been set in a square with tablets for sons, and grandsons etc and other family members.
The family grave site…
Interestingly, on google earth, the site can be located to the ‘top corner’ of the cemetery should you wish to make your own pilgrimage … I, in particular, was so pleased to have been. The Mate too, it appeared…
I didn’t actually receive any ‘Conrad’ gifts for the event being celebrated, but am assured that if books are listed on a ‘desired’ list, then they’re likely to appear … but I did find these classics amongst my parcels!
Francis B. Cook – Small Yacht Cruising, and Coastwise Cruising…
Grant Allen – Tidal Thames (a reprint), and Francis B. Cook – Weekend Yachting.
I shall report as and when…