NavList:
A Community Devoted to the Preservation and Practice of Celestial Navigation and Other Methods of Traditional Wayfinding
Re: Nevil Maskelyne.
From: George Huxtable
Date: 2004 Jul 19, 09:54 +0100
From: George Huxtable
Date: 2004 Jul 19, 09:54 +0100
Dan Allen asked- >Did you happen to fix Nevil Maskelyne's grave position by GPS? Perhaps you >could bring one of those along as well, so when I come to the UK I can easily >find the grave. I would like to visit Nevil's final resting place... it sounds >like a nice town. Reply from George- Well, Purton's just a village really, not a town. Which is about 4 miles NW of Swindon, not my favourite city. I will supply Dan with the information on condition that he phones me when he visits (01865 820222 from within UK), so that we can (at least) enjoy a pint together. Maskelyne's tomb is a stone object above ground, close against the South wall of the church. The plaque is close to the same spot, but inside the church. Once, the tomb had been enclosed within wrought-iron railings, but these have been crudely cut off near ground level and the stumps remain visible. Presumably, that was a legacy from the 1939-45 war, when anything made of iron was collected for munitions. I remember, as a young lad in Liverpool in the early 1940's, the teams going round with a horse and cart to rip out any house railings, and what a difference it made to the look of the suburbs afterwards. Nobody minded; they felt they were "doing their bit". The coordinates Dan asked for are as follows (taken from an OS map). 1deg 51.5'W. 51deg 35.0'N. This is on the OSGB36 (Ordnance Survey of Great Britain 1936) datum, which is near enough to the GPS standard datum WGS84 to ensure that the distinctive church, with (unusually) both a spire and another tower, will be well within view. In terms of Ordnance Survey National Grid coordinates, to be found on many maps, this is in square SU (or 41) and it's SU096872 or, as I prefer, 40961872. But Dan will find that with the British road system (if, indeed, it can be dignified by the word "system"), Cartesian coordinates are of little help in finding the way from A to B. A local pilot is often best. George. ================================================================ contact George Huxtable by email at george@huxtable.u-net.com, by phone at 01865 820222 (from outside UK, +44 1865 820222), or by mail at 1 Sandy Lane, Southmoor, Abingdon, Oxon OX13 5HX, UK. ================================================================