Friday 9 May 2014

Thrift and the Press Gang

 
 
We went to Chesil beach and Portland today.  At Chesil beach there are great swathes of Thrift, lovely pink carpets of them.   We went onto Portland, we stopped to visit the church, St George.  It has a fantastic graveyard which is being managed for wildlife.  We wandered around, I was reading some of the graves which can be interesting.  I found one grave, the grave of a twenty-one year old girl, Mary Way, who was shot by a Press gang in 1803.  Apparently the Press gang came to Portland to try and capture some men for their ship but the village (There was no road at the time between Portland and Weymouth, Portland was an isolated village) fought to stop men being taken and a gun was fired, two people were shot.  Mary Way was shot in the back and as you can see on her grave she died of her wound a few weeks later.   Very sad, I have tried to read the inscription at the bottom, quite moving.
 


Mary Way's grave.  I think the inscription reads:

Here immortality with beauty lies
Confind from Earth to kindred skys
Her life was short her Death severe
Stop Reader think and shed a tear



4 comments:

holdingmoments said...

What a stunning sight, all that Thrift.

And poor Mary; a violent way to die.

Richard Pegler said...

Such beauty and such a sad tale in close proximity. It's amazing the stories that graveyards have to offer.

A beautiful post, Linda.

Roy Norris said...

Lovely scene with all that Thrift Lyn.
I was in Weymouth on Friday.{:))

Linda Yarrow said...

Thankyou Keith, Richard & Roy.