A Bench with a View

It was a blustery Monday at the cemetery with a chill in the air and rain on the wind, but it didn’t prevent me from stopping at my favourite bench.

There are four benches (I’m honour bound to keep the 4th one secret) in the cemetery; but this is my favourite one with a view across what was previously known as New Swindon, a railway town.

Here the eye is drawn to the housing development built in the early 2000s on the site of the ‘A’ (Erecting) Shop. A Shop covered more than 11 acres (coincidentally the same size as Radnor Street Cemetery) and was one the largest covered workshops in the world. The red brick apartment blocks, clearly seen from the bench, and the surrounding houses are named in honour of George Jackson Churchward Locomotive Works Manager at the GWR Swindon Works 1902-1916 and Chief Mechanical Engineer from 1916 until his retirement in 1922.

From this bench you can see what remains of the 19^th century railway works, more familiar to a younger generation as the McArthur Glen Designer Outlet Village and the railway village, the company houses once home to the early workforce. So many of those railway men and their families moved up the hill to rest in peace in this cemetery.

It was at this bench that I composed the ghostly story of Edie and her soldier son – a tribute to one Swindon family, yet typical of so many others.

This is my favourite bench. Perhaps we’ll meet here one day.