WRESTLING BARONET

Wairarapa Times-Age, 15 October 1940, Page 7

WRESTLING BARONET

MOST EXTRAORDINARY MAN. He was lord of the manor at Bunny in Nottinghamshire. A most extraordinary man, he had a passion for wrestling. His servants were men who had managed to throw him, and he established an annnual wrestling match in the village, supporting it with great enthusiasm. A noted wrestler himself, he studied the sport as a science, and wrote learnedly on it. When he died in 1741 he had a monument showing death giving him the backfall.

But he was much more than a wrestler. He was a living Sir Roger de Coverley. Taught mathematics by Sir Isaac Newton, and an able architect and builder, he rebuilt all his property raised the most remarkable wall seen in England—a length of brickworksupported on arches, and a boundary three miles long round his broad estates —and planted trees. He restored the church. He gave the vicar a new house to live in. and he raised a curious tower on a hill.

His Latin grammar was used in the village school. He was a model Justice of the Peace, an ideal landlord, a lovable if eccentric squire. In all his long life of over 80 years he never had a day’s illness till his end was near. He rang the bells for people to go to church. He walked miles across country. He ran with the best. He learnt the principles of medicine so that he might heal his tenants if they were

And he collected stone coffins. Whenever he could buy a stone coffin, he bought it. and went on buying them till he had a remarkable collection, a gruesome sight in Bunny churchyard. He selected one for himself, and told his tenants they could choose whichever of the remainder they cared for. When he died there passed out of England one of the most lovable of all astonishing people. He was Sir Thomas Parkyns.