Verey Head Gardener Chris Sharples investigates a mysterious terracotta monument.

In January 2021, I started in my new role as Verey Head Gardener. One of my first jobs was to remove an over-sized laurel beside the Gallery lawn. In the hedgerow here, we found a terracotta cross laid flat, but with some purpose in its position.

In Spring that year, I showed it to the garden volunteers. It was the fabulous Sheila Dobson who had the idea to write to Richard Jefferies, former Curator and with a life-long association with the Gallery. It wasn’t long before we received a copperplate hand-written reply which explained that it was Wilfred Blunt (1901-87, Curator 1959-83) who had placed the cross in its position in memory of a much-loved cat. The cross, probably being old stock left over from the then closed pottery.

So, there we were. Mystery solved. The cross was simply a pet grave. Well, not quite. For when Wilfred Blunt died in 1987, he asked that his ashes be scattered over the resting place of his beloved cat.

Wilfred Blunt was a celebrated author, publishing 25 books in all, 8 of which are on the history of flowers and plants. So, he clearly had a very keen horticultural interest. His brother was Sir Anthony Blunt, spy and Keeper of the Queen’s Pictures who apparently hid with Wilfred for a short time when the press were on his back after his disgrace.

Wilfred Blunt is remembered today with the naming of The Blunt Woodland, where children can play, just over Sandy Lane. So appropriate now we know his mortal remains lay so close by.