The one which will stay a mystery …………..

 Sometimes you have to accept that a story has run its course with no resolution.

Not that I expected to find out the identity of a certain Hampson whose gravestone was deposited in Walkden Gardens a long time ago.

It was part of a pile of memorial inscriptions which were taken from the old Brooklands cemetery and dumped in the park, later to be recycled ad edging and kerb stones.

I doubt I would have ever come across them and certainly not set off on the search for the identity of Hampson if Andy Robertson had taken a walk through the park.

And having set off through Walkden Gardens he photographed some of the lost stone inscriptions.

Most of them record the names of stone masons, who left their names on the small edging stones which formed the border of the grave plots.

But one inscription was much larger, leaving Andy to speculate that this was actually part of a gravestone, belonging someone called Hampson, who was buried in the old Brooklands cemetery.

Of course a walk around the cemetery would not reveal anything given that the Hampson gravestone was no longer where it had been so reverently placed, which led me to seek the help of Trafford Local Studies Centre and in particular Sonia Llewellyn the Local Studies Advisor, 

Sonia replied to my request with “We do hold a CD ROM listing memorial inscriptions in the old part of the cemetery, which was compiled by the Ashton and Sale History Society. 

If there is anyone I can look up for you, just let me know”.

And I did ask, and kindly Sonia sent over the results which offered up twenty headstones, recording the deaths and internment of 61 people.  

Not all were Hampsons, but those that weren’t, rested with Hampson’s.

The burials span the period from 1872 through to 1978, with the youngest an infant and the oldest aged 84, and contain a mix of “memorial language” from the conventional “departed this life” to the touching  “who sweetly fell asleep in Jesus”, and the intriguing reference to a Edward Hampson of Manchester, "late of Moscow”.

But sadly, I am no nearer identifying the memorial stone found by Andy, other than that it appears to have no other names or details, which raises the possibility that it belongs to none of the above.

Leaving me just to thank Sonia, and Andy.

Location; Walkden Gardens

Pictures; Walkden Gardens, 2020 from the collection of Andy Robertson

*Trafford Local Studies Centre, https://www.trafford.gov.uk/residents/leisure-and-lifestyle/libraries/Local-Studies/Trafford-Local-Studies.aspx