Tribute to Rupert Brooke

Rupert Brooke's memorial (photo in PiP)
There was no security at all in 1984. The place was deserted.

While sailing in the Sporades Islands, we had anchored in Tris Boukes bay with a couple of the other YCA yachts. We had heard about the grave from the YCA lead crew so we rowed ashore, found the track and walked up to the grave. It was a beautiful setting.

We stayed overnight in the bay and the YCA group were the only people there. A delightful, tranquil anchorage. No doubt, Skyros is much busier now.

I also took a photo of the inscription on the tablet of Rupert Brooke’s poem ‘The Soldier’

If I should die, think only this of me:
That there's some corner of a foreign field
That is for ever England. There shall be
In that rich earth a richer dust concealed;
A dust whom England bore, shaped, made aware,
Gave, once, her flowers to love, her ways to roam,
A body of England's, breathing English air,
Washed by the rivers, blest by suns of home.
And think, this heart, all evil shed away,
A pulse in the eternal mind, no less
Gives somewhere back the thoughts by England given;
Her sights and sounds; dreams happy as her day;
And laughter, learnt of friends; and gentleness,
In hearts at peace, under an English heaven.

Rupert Chawner Brooke (3 August 1887 – 23 April 1915 was an English poet known for his idealistic war sonnets written during the First World War, especially "The Soldier". He was also known for his boyish good looks, which were said to have prompted the Irish poet W. B. Yeats to describe him as "the handsomest young man in England"...
Brooke sailed with the British Mediterranean Expeditionary Force on 28 February 1915 but developed sepsis from an infected mosquito bite. He died at 4:46 pm on 23 April 1915, on the French hospital ship Duguay-Trouin, moored in a bay off the Greek island of Skyros in the Aegean Sea, while on his way to the landing at Gallipoli. As the expeditionary force had orders to depart immediately, Brooke was buried at 11 pm in an olive grove on Skyros.
Wikipedia

émouvant . Merci pour ces informations intéressantes.

Thanks Nautilus

toll, dass Du uns so viele schöne Bilder von dieser Wetterstimmung zeigst!

Thanks Chrissy. It just seemed so appropriate for Rupert Brooke's memory.

Touching story, on caption and on comments.

Thanks Sami

touching, thanks for the interesting information.

Thanks Wierd

What a sad way to go. Excellent photo to go with the poem.