The Grave of Champernowne. John Elwyn. New England: Newcastle, N. H. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, ed. 1876-79. Poems of Places: An Anthology in 31 Volumes. America: Vols. XXV-XXIX

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Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, ed. Poems of Places: An Anthology in 31 Volumes.
America: Vols. XXV–XXIX. 1876–79.

New England: Newcastle, N. H.

The Grave of Champernowne

John Elwyn

Francis Champernowne lies buried on the sea-side of Gerrish Island, his only monument a little pile of small stones. Thomas de Cambernon was the ancestor to whom the Champernownes traced back their descent. “Modbury’s blazoned door” alludes to one of his descendants, the mother of Sir Walter Raleigh, who was a Champernowne of Mudbury.

THOMAS DE CAMBERNON for Hastings’ field
Left Normandy; his tower saw him no more!
And no crusader’s war-horse plumed and steeled
Paws the grass now at Modbury’s blazoned door;
No lettered marble nor ancestral shield,—	5
Where all the Atlantic shakes the lonesome shore,
Lies ours forgotten; only cobble-stones
To tell us where are Champernowne’s poor bones.

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