Papa Belcombe's Corner Office

Gotta catch em' all!

I say it all the time; gotta catch 'em all! The Belcombes and their graves. I feel an intense addiction to finding the Belcombe’s and their gravesites, unknown or forgotten to the world for so long, hidden behind overgrown trees and among brambles and thorn bushes. The lost graves that require you to use your machete (if you had one) to hack down the vines that twist and turn to choke out their stories. Or those elusive stones, hidden in the open, watching the world go by and waiting for someone to utter their name. 

If Mrs. Belcombe picked out Daddy B’s final resting place, I’d like her to pick out mine as well. He sits in the SW corner of St Mary’s church in Scarborough under a weeping willow, technically overlooking the ocean if there weren’t buildings in the way. But some portions of the North Sea are visible from his stone. It’s picturesque and funny to know he was hiding in plain sight this entire time. And when I say plain sight, I mean just the stone. It’s so weathered that unless you are looking straight at it, you wouldn’t know it was his. And even then, you have to really struggle to make out the name Belcombe.

The journey to Dr. B’s corner office occurred with several stops and starts. Early on, my friend Sarah and I had exhausted all possibilities of finding him. The graveyard of St. Mary’s had undergone quite a few changes since Willie’s time, and there was no guarantee his stone still existed. A wonderfully kind chap at St. Mary’s had directed us to his burial record in the church records book, so we had proof that he was there, somewhere. Many of the older gravestones once had metal plaques, many of which have been moved inside the church. You can still see the indentations on some of the stones where they originally existed. We assumed the most we could find was his plaque inside the church. And as luck would have it, how often do you think we got to the church to find it closed or closing? I think it ended up being 4 separate visits between the two of us. I almost felt like the Belcombe patriarch was trying to give us the cold shoulder. But we persisted.

We know from several sources that he died in and was buried in Scarborough. Anne writes about it in her journal, there are letters between her and Mariana and Lou speaking to the location, and the church record indicates he was buried there. But I wanted to see the gravestone and touch it for myself. On one of my visits this spring, I made a day trip to Scarborough to see if I could see the plaque inside the church, having no expectations that he still existed in the graveyard. 

Long story short, I got to the church, and it was closed! Daddy B - 5, Me - 0. Ooof that one hurt! I’ve walked the churchyard before, casually exploring graves out of interest, not expecting to see the name Belcombe. I believed the information that said he probably wasn’t in the graveyard anymore, so why look, right? Eh, I’m always up for a challenge. Some areas of the graveyard are still intact, other areas have been turned into parking lots, and in other areas, the gravestones have been artfully lined up in snaking geometric patterns.

I have all day; let’s start looking! I start in the NE corner of the graveyard and read every stone I can. I get to the last section of the yard, right next to the stairs back to the road, and I spot him. I can barely make out the tracings of some of the letters. But I know what it says: BELCOMBE!

His stone is very weathered, but you can see the name, the date, and a few other words that tell you it’s the grave of Daddy B. His grave is the most unique of all the immediate family. I would love to see an early picture before the sea salt slowly stripped away the stone grains. You can tell it was purposefully and thoughtfully chosen. And as always, there are now more questions than answers. 

Why was Mrs. Belcombe not buried with her late husband? Did they plan to bury Daddy B in Scarborough, or was that a decision based on costs and illness? Did Mrs. Belcombe originally want to be buried with her husband in Scarbro'? Maybe she was buried in York, where she died, to save money. Maybe the widow’s life suited her, and she was completely fine living and dying on her own terms for those last 14 years of her life. I want all the answers!

Close-up of the front of Dr. Belcombe's 3-sided gravestone, with inscription.

[----]

WILLIAM BELCOMBE M.D.

[-----]

WHO DIED NOVEMBER -----

[----------------] YEAR [--]

Front of Dr. Belcombe's 3-sided grave stone

Right side of Dr. Belcombe's 3-sided grave stone

Courtesy of West Yorkshire Archives - SH:7/ML/305 - Draft letter from AL to Lou Belcombe, including the grave inscription options Anne Lister drafted in Latin for the Belcombes. 

Thursday 29 

6 10/60 

11 1/4 

@ 

+

A kiss last night ~Dawdling and talking to M- [Mariana] breakfast at 8 55/60 — at my desk at 9 3/4 — from then to 

about 1 1/2 at my accounts — writing out Mr. Briggs’s account up to the end of last year etc. — M- [Mariana] wrote to Watson — sent 

the letter at 11, and then wrote to Mrs. Milne, in whose letter yesterday to M- [Mariana] Lou wrote the ends asking me for a Latin 

inscription with one Latin line, in memory of her father — Looked out Mr Knights Latin epitaph on the Duke 

of Lancaster and copied it without naming it to π [Mariana] this gave me the hint of Heautontimorumenos act 1, 

scene 1 — ‘Homo sum, nihil humani nihil à me alienum puto’ [I am human, I consider nothing human to be foreign to me] — went up into the library — looked into 

Terence, and then into Echard’s Translation of ditto — then turned to Drake’s Eboracum, but could not find any monumental 

inscription from which to determ determine whether I was right in writing Gulielmus Belcombe, Eboraco, M.D. 

meaning of York — Eboraco — sat down and wrote 2 1/2 ppages to Lou — saying M- [Mariana] had wrote to Mrs. Milne, that I was 

too busy to attend to other concerns than my own — I was indeed very busy but unwilling to let Lou have no 

answer more satisfactory than this — regretted M- [Mariana] had not left me room to save Lou postage ‘my first 

‘observation was, a Latin inscription! I have known people think days and weeks upon such a thing without being able to 

‘determine — Steph would do it much better than I — I am too fast forgetting all the Latin I ever knew — you 

‘want something very short, and a character such as your father’s summing up in one line — I knew him well; and 

‘none who did know him will quarrel with my heartfelt application of the celebrated line from Terence, which I shall 

‘venture to subjoin - M.S. 

Gulielmi Belcombe, Eboraco M.D. 

obiit die XVII Novembri anno domini MDCCCXXVIII. 

Ætatis suæ LXXII. 

Homo cum esset, humani nihil à se alienum putavit. [Since he was human, he considered nothing human to be foreign to him.] 

or would you like better Multis ille bonis flebilis occidit [he fell lamented by many good men]. Horace, book 1. Ode 24. thus translated by Francis How did the good, the virtuous mourn and pour their sorrows o’er his urn! 

1829 

January 

L 

+ 

‘The line, slightly altered to suit the occasion, is in the first act, and near the beginning of the first scene 

‘of the Heautontimorumenos, or self-tormentor of Terence, meaning, that, being a man, there was no act 

‘of humanity that he felt not to be his duty concern — On the death of your so excellent father, for whom you so well 

‘knew my high esteem and regard, and on the subject of a less recent affliction, deep to you all, but more especially 

‘so to Mrs. Milne, I hope M- [Mariana] has long ago expressed my heartfelt condolence — I trust, I need not now assure you, 

‘that there is no circumstance, affecting the happiness or the interests of your family, which does not sincerely and deeply 

‘concern me — As I am writing myself, I cannot leave it wholly to M- [Mariana] to express my best regards and 

‘thanks to your mother for her so kind message, and offer of a bed — my being able to leave home at present, is 

‘not quite certain as yet; but I hope to accompany M- [Mariana] some day next week — She seems to expect having 

‘her own establishment at Scarborough, otherwise it would give me pleasure to avail myself of your mother’s 

‘kindness’ — we are attentively reading Dr. Lambe — ‘It is long since I have been so cast on 

‘Hippocratic lore’ etc. etc. ‘I beg my best regards to your family circle, and am, my dear Lou, affectionately yours Anne Lister’ — 


Anne Lister - Thursday, January 29, 1829 - SH:7/ML/E/11/0130

So now, as I push forward in the name of the Belcombes, I can add another notch to the gravestone and a picture to the album and clean the dirt from under my nails. And prepare for my next graveyard celebration dance. 

With each final resting place, I’m not just uncovering a lost stone, I’m also uncovering and discovering parts of me that have been hidden. Perhaps traumas and experiences I've bound in thorn bushes and overgrown trees and shoved into dark corners of my internal graveyard of feelings. With each buried Belcombe I find, I quite literally dig up part of myself, and I think that’s a wonderful thing. 

Not every person that helps change our lives has to climb mountains or be famous or buck convention. Sometimes it’s just your average person, struggling through the vines of life, that helps you cut down yours. And that’s one of the many reasons I love the Belcombes.

Dr. Belcombe