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This is the story about the Marble Vase headstone for Keith Dinning and Patricia Kearsley, The Two Bonny Bairns.
In 1988
Ron and I visited the UK, during that time we went to St Mary's
Church in Caterham Surrey to try to find my brother Keith's grave.
Keith was my baby brother
who died at the age of 12 months.
On this visit we were unable to contact
anybody in the church office and we were unable to find his
grave as it was an unmarked Grave. We left a rose lying in the graveyard and hoped
we guessed it was the right place.
Some years later when I was in Australia trying to piece
together about Keith's last resting place I saw a show ' Who Do You Think You Are' and in this show there was a segment
about shared Graves in the UK. Shared Graves were available to
families who could not afford a proper single grave. These Graves were never marked.
I began to
wonder if this had
happened to Keith.
We
once again returned to the UK in 2010 and this time we were on a
mission. Our mission was to clarify and resolve as many loose ends in
our family history as possible. One of the challenges at the top of our list was to
find Keith's resting place.
We went to St Mary's
Church in Caterham Surrey, with Margaret and Derek Jackson (My Uncle and his Wife) with the objective of finding Keith's grave, As luck had it, the office at the Church was open this time and the lady in the
church office was very helpful, she informed us of the
whereabouts of the grave.
Although Derek was 100% sure that Keith would not be in a shared grave as my Grandfather would have paid for Keith's grave, the lady in the office confirmed that
Keith was in fact in a shared grave. Derek was shocked. It was disclosed to us that
Keith shared the grave with Patricia Kearsley. Patricia had died as a
child around 12 months old in 1914. Her father was in the
Grenadier Guards and was stationed at Caterham Barracks. Patricia
had died of meningitis.
Ron and I sought permission to place a Marble Vase on Keith and Patricia's Grave.
Ron and I chose a Vase known as the Violet Vase, my Grandmother's name is Violet.
We had the Stone Mason write Keith's name on one side and Patricia's on the
other, hence the the reference of the two Bonnie
Bairns. .
We had the vase made so that flowers could be put into it.
When my cousin Claire went to put the first lot of Flowers in the
vase she was sure she heard a child's musical box playing and
she thought the Bairns were happy.
I believe that Clare did hear
this, my grandmother always said that She, Claire and I were 'One of Us' as we all seemed to have ESP, Eva Burchell is also
'One of Us' as she too has ESP.
1922 - 2010 (87 years)
