CHRISTCHURCH 

The Priory

The Shelley Memorial

Percy Bysshe Shelley seems to have been something of a wilful young man.  He was sent down from Oxford for publishing a pamphlet promoting atheism and ran away to Scotland to marry a sixteen-year-old bride called Harriet Westbrook.  In 1814 he dumped her and eloped with Mary Godwin to the Continent, where he wrote excellent poetry on the themes of free-love, liberty and the nature of reality.  In 1816, Harriet, pregnant by another man, drowned herself in the Thames, thus allowing Percy and Mary to marry. 

In 1822, he and two others were drowned off the coast of Italy while sailing his yacht 'Ariel', which foundered in a storm.

This monument was erected by his son in 1854, more than thirty years after his father's death and must be regarded as more an act of family reverence towards his work than much to do with the life of Shelley.  It was first offered to St. Peters Church in Bournemouth, where the rest of the Shelleys are buried, but was declined on account of its size and possibly the unspoken disapproval of Shelley's reputation by the incumbent and churchwardens.

The monument is by Henry Weeks in the style of Pieta.

Mary (Wollstonecraft) Shelley is best known for writing 'Frankenstein'.