GRAVE DISTURBED

Evening Post, Volume CXXVI, Issue 136, 6 December 1938, Page 17

GRAVE DISTURBED

ABBEY SEARCH

NOT TOMB OF SPENSER

DEAN'S STATEMENT

(By Air Mail, trom "The Post's" London

Representative.)

LONDON. November 5.

Shakespeare still is Shakespeare! The search in the Poets' Corner of Westminster Abbey for Spenser's grave was unsuccessful, and no evidence was produced to suggest that Bacon was Shakespeare. So while the controversy remains where it was, a new mystery has presented itself. Where is Spenser buried?

After secret excavations in the Abbey for two days an unidentified lead coffin was unearthea, but no manuscripts and, no pens (stated to have been cast into the grave by contemporary poets when Spenser was buried) were found.

Following the search, an official statement was issued by the Dean of Westminster, Bishop de Labilliere. It said:—

"The search for the grave of Edmund Spenser took place in Westminster Abbey on November 2 and 3. The space immediately in front of the Spenser monument was found to be taken up by solid foundations, and further search showed that the nearest grave was 12 feet to the north of the monument. It had been cut out of the foundations to a depth of 3ft Sin from pavement level. This grave was carefully examined, and. was found to contain a lead coffin.

"There was no inscription, or other means of identifying this, but there was reason to believe that it was postElizabethan. There were indications that two other interments had taken place in the same grave, but it was impossible to assign any definite date for these.

"NO FURTHER SEARCH."

"The contents of the lead coffin were not disturbed, but the ground around was carefully sifted and revealed no trace of any manuscript or pens. The search was under the supervision of the Dean of Westminster, Sir Charles Peers, i Mr. Lawrence Tanner, and Professor Plenderleith, of the British Museum. No further search is contemplated."

The search was made at the request of the Bacon Society. It had been stated that when Spenser was buried in the Poets' Corner contemporary poets cast into the grave laudatory verses and the quill pens with which they were written. Shakespeare is said to have paid tribue in this way and if his parchment were found the handwriting, the Bacon Society hoped, would settle the Shakespeare-Bacon controversy.

The only thing of interest which has come to light is that blocks of thick masonry have been discovered which may prove to be the foundations of one part of the original abbey which has since been built up.

The work was done behind canvas screens. Three officials of the Bacon Society were present. The lead coffin found was in a collapsed condition. There was no trace of any woodwork around it. The soil was very dry and powdery and workmen sifted this with fine-meshed sieves for traces of the pens or parchment. Official photographs were taken.

MIGHT BE PRIOR,

Mr. R. L. Eagle, of the Bacon Society, said that it was a pity that the search for Spenser's grave had been abandoned.

"There is good reason to believe," he said, "that the coffin found in the search was that of Matthew Prior, who died in 1721 and expressed a wish to the Dean of the time to be buried near Spenser. In those days they, too, had no idea where Spenser had been buried, but it is likely that it was, as Camden said, near'the Chaucer monument, some thirty feet from the Spenser monument. It is unlikely that they would have dug through solid masonry for Spenser's grave. More likely they would have gone through soft ground near the Chaucer monument."

"I insisted that no coffin should be opened," the Dean said. "As the poems were not placed in the coffin, it would have been pointless. We have given all facilities for the search —and it has proved fruitless. There is nothing more to say.

ABBEY NOT TO BE "DUG UP."

"There were enormous difficulties in th.c way: we did not know the exact site of the tomb. The coffin we did discover, I think, was not Spenser's. And although there is, I suppose, natural anxiety to proceed further, I do not propose to have the whole Abbey dug up."

An official of the Bacon Society said: "Eighty years after Spenser's death a slab was laid to his memory near a doorway. Footsteps completely wore away the lettering within the next 100 years, and another monument was then put up, but at an entirely different place. Hence the difficulty of the Poets' Corner investigation."

Besides the supervisors there were present at the search the Duke of Rutland, Mr. Bertram Theobald and Mr. Valentine Smith, president and secretary of the Bacon Society; Canon S. J. Marriott, Canon of Westminster; Mr. F. C. Wellstood, secretary and librarian to. the Trustees of the Shakespeare Birthplace Society; Mr. P. J. Spencer-Tiddeman, a descendant of Edmund Spenser; and Mr. R. P. Howgrove Graham, hon. photographer to the Abbey authorities.

Commenting on the "new puzzle" as to where Spenser is buried, the "News Chronicle" says:—"The logical outcome is obviously a theory that Spenser was not really Spenser but the Faerie Queenev"

BACON SOCIETY'S ATTITUDE

Despite the Dean's statement, the Bacon Society is anxious that the search for Spenser's grave shall be renewed. The attitude of the society has been explained by the president, Mr. Bertram G. Theobald. He said that the Dean wrote that the authorities were by no means certain that it was the right one.

"This conjecture that it was the wrong grave turned out to be accurate." said Mr. Theobald. "There is no doubt that it was not the grave of Edmund Spenser, because, when the sides of the leaden coffin were cleared of the soil, handles were discovered These handles are considered by ex perts to be probably of eighteenth cen tury date. If this is correct, then it rules out the theory that the coffin was Spenser's.

"In our view the most likely place ■for Spenser's grave is near Chaucer's monument, because Camden said that Spenser was buried near Chaucer. The Chaucer monument is a considerable distance north of the grave which was opened." ■

An elephant belonging to a Gei'man circus has eaten —and successfully digested—a rucksack. He was being led from the railway station at Kahla to the local shooting festival when tie discovered a rucksack on the seat of a farmer's cart. It contained 31b of sausage and 31b of bread. Seizing the rucksack with his trunk, the elephant stuffed it into his mouth and swallowed it whole.