10Oct2008: Day 137: Sittingbourne and the search for Great Grandpa

Today we sat around most of the morning vegging. My mother went back to bed for about an hour trying to work off their Jet Lag. We decided after lunch to head out to find Sittingbourne cemetery where my Great Grandfather is buried. He caught lockjaw playing football (soccer)after running into a fence and died. Apparently, he was really well liked and the football teams in the area put together some money and that is what my Great Grandmother used to come to the United States. So, we set out to find his grave. We found the old homestead and took a wrong turn and hit a dead end. Coincidentally, a Funeral home was at the end of that dead end, so we took it as fate and Dad went in to see if they could tell us where the cemetery was. The lady in there actually gave Dad a map of the cemetery and directions to get there. We found the area where he must have been buried. My mother remembered a picture of the grave and that there was a cross on it. We looked at every grave that had a cross, even righting a fallen over one to see the names on them, but in the end none were his. My mother remembers it likely being a wooden one and for that reason we think the cross must have disintegrated many years ago. We counted out to the 81st plot, which the documentation said he was buried in, at least what we thought was the plot and sure enough there were several unmarked graves, one of which must have been his. So, we gave up...a little disappointed.



Here is Makenna playing on top of some poor dead person's grave. Sorry dead person...