218 



Ciivlg 6nibc$toiic$ founi at Cvotokibgc, 



By the Kev. E. H. Goddakd. 



In the Wiltshire Chronicle of November 22iid, 1902, under the 

 head of " Old Trowbridge," there appeared a cut and a short 

 description of a remarkable gravestone discovered there three days 

 before that date. On the 26th the Rev. J. Penrose, of West 

 Ashton, kindly visited the spot, made enquiries, and wrote as 

 follows : — 



" I was in Trowbridge to-day, and took the opportunty of looking at the 

 digging whence the stone came. A new building has just been completed by 

 the Co-op. Society about 100 yards north of the present Court House. In 

 digging the foundations and excavating for the concrete floors the workmen 

 told me that they had come on a number of skeletons, in fact they said the 

 ground was full of human remains, apparently buried anyhow ; some upright, 

 some lying across each other. These remains have been put back, and the 

 ground is now filled in and the concreting of the floors begun. The area was 

 till lately occupied by some old tenements pulled down to make way for the 

 new building. It was in digging the drain on the south of the new building 

 that they came on the stone figured in the Gitronicle. It was about 3 feet 

 under the present ground level. A second stone was also found just to the 

 east of the first. I saw the place where this second stone had come out, and 

 it looked to me as if the stone had originally been laid on the surface and 

 all the soil above was the accumulation of time. The workmen said that 

 they had found nothing in the way of metal of any sort, no coin, or anything 

 but bones and these two stones." 



The spot was within the area of the Castle, of which no trace 

 now remains, and was presumably the Castle cemetery. 



Both the stones were at once secured by Mr. Henry Blake, 

 Chairman of the Urban District Council, and were placed by him 

 for a time under a temporary shelter at the back of the Town 

 Hall, whence they were finally removed to the Church, where they 

 have been most happily placed at the west end of the south aisle. 

 Here they will be preserved with the security and care that their 

 interesting character deserves. 



