The name Australia was given to the Southern continent by Captain Matthew Flinders, whose remains were among those of about 50,000 people exhumed from St James's cemetery next to Euston Station and reburied in Brookwood in Surrey. To make room for the London terminus of the UK's High Speed 2 railway. Which may never be built. Should've stayed in Oz.
Flinders was the first to circumnavigate Australia. He is of course memorialised there: there's the Flinders Range, Flinders Island in the Bass Strait, Station and Street in Melbourne, the University in Adelaide, the Flinders Chase National Park on Kangaroo Island and many statues.
One of the most well-known (although not by me until now) statues is actually in Euston Station, erected in 2014 (the bicentenary of Flinders' death) and is of Flinders and his cat Trim. ChatGPT tells me Trim is "beloved by many Australians", although of the many Australians I have met over there (including my elder son, his wife and her family) not one has ever mentioned this cat. You can check out much more about Trim here:
This picture of the Euston statue is from an interesting website London Remembers:
Trim is nowhere to be seen but is probably snuggled up to the sleeping traveller. This from the Mitchell Library in Sydney will have to suffice for you cat-lovers:
ReplyDeleteYou’re writing about one of our own here in Charlton. Ann Flinders is buried here in the churchyard of St Thomas on Woodland Terrace. Her grave has been cleaned and beautifully restored by a group of local volunteers. I think you’ve met some of them.
She had a tough life in many ways. She and Matthew had planned to voyage together but when the Admiralty found out they strictly forbade it and after just three months of marriage Matthew set sail and she didn’t see him for nine years. After his return they had one daughter whose own daughter Ann Flinders Petrie was the mother of the great Egyptologist Flinders Petrie. They lived in Maryon Road. Ann was a very talented botanist, water colourist, musician and writer.
Her husband died not long after his return and her widowhood was long.
Her grave is now surrounded with lovely planting and she is remembered in her own right.
I have a photograph of her grave but can’t seem to attach it. I’ll send it by other means.
https://charlton.church/garden-of-reflection-at-st-thomas/
Interesting, although I was expecting a cat comment
DeleteI sent one by other means
ReplyDelete