On My Walk
or rather, during my Monday morning cleaning…
the crates arrived containing the very fine memorial to George Steevens (1736 –1800) sculpted by John Flaxman RA ( 1755 – 1826). Steevens was a parishioner of HPC, living at the Upper Flask (now the site of Queen Mary’s House) from 1771 until his death. He had family connections in Poplar however, so was buried there. After that church was deconsecrated in 1977 the memorial was moved to the Fitzwilliam museum in Cambridge, where it has been in store for almost all of the last 40 years. The sculpture conservator from the museum who brought it to Hampstead said that his first task at the Fitzwilliam 40 years ago was moving it from Poplar to Cambridge. It is now fixed to the formerly very blank wall of the Lady Chapel, above the entrance to the clergy vestry, and will be well worth a good look as soon as the church can be fully open again.