Alfred Beague Gundry - Drowned by the Upsetting of a Boat

Taphophilia is a passion for and enjoyment of cemeteries. The singular term is a taphophile.

Monument of Alfred Beague Gundry, St Michael's Churchyard, Bray, Berkshire

"Sacred to the memory of Alfred Beague Gundry. Youngest son of Walter Eustace Gundry ESQre late of Bridport Dorset who was drowned by the upsetting of a boat on the Thames at Bray Weir on the 18th April 1862 aged 26 years

~ Sincerely beloved and deeply lamented. What I do thou knowest not now, but thou shalt know here after.

I am the resurrection and the life (rest illegible) ~"

 

Alfred Beague Gundry was indeed the youngest son of Walter Eustace Gundry and Susan Jarvis, born on 7th July 1835 in Bridport Dorset. He came from a rather upper-class family his father being an accountant and his elder brothers employed as Bank of England Clerks, they all lived in the affluent Pembroke Square in Kensington, London.

 

Alfred fist appears on the 1841 Census living at his grandfather Samuel's home in East Street, Bridport, Dorset, with his parents and siblings.

East Street, Bridport, Dorset c1914

 

By 1851 the family had moved to 8 Pembroke Square, Kensington, London

On the 1861 Census a year before his tragic and untimely death Alfred is listed as an accountant boarding at 14 Everett Street in Finsbury, London.

Quite what was Alfred doing mucking about in a boat on the river Thames on that fateful day in April? In the Victorian era, mucking about on the river pleasure boating or 'punting' was very much in vogue. Anybody who was anybody was to be seen bobbing about on the river. Pleasure punts in use in England were first built around 1860 and reached the peak of their popularity in the 1910s.

 

However, punting was not an easy pastime.

 "Punting is not as easy as it looks. As in rowing, you soon learn to get along and handle the craft, but it takes long practice before you can do this with dignity and without getting water up your sleeve." ~ Jerome K Jerome. Three Men in a Boat (1889).

Alfred may have simply been inexperienced and got into difficulties, which the weir only added to. Rather surprisingly at the time, not everyone who partook in the activity of punting on the river was able to swim.

Bray Weir taken in 1883 by Henry W Taunt

So sad that a day of pleasure and mucking about in boats should end so tragically and cut short the life of a young man.

The London Illustrated News reported on Alfred's death on 26th April 1862:

"Drowned, on the 18th of April, by the upsetting of a boat on the Thames at Maidenhead, to the inexpressible grief of his family and friends, Alfred Beague, second surviving son of Walter Eustace Gundry, Esq., Sussex House, Jersey, aged 26 years."