Hello again folks,
I began writing this on my flight back from England where I attended the memorial service for C.K. Shepherd’s son, Charles Shaw on Thursday, 18 January 2024. Apart from the reason for the journey, I had a wonderful time. I was in the U.K. for only two nights, but I never felt rushed.
Charles had made arrangements for his own memorial service at the St. Nicholas Church in Houghton, West Sussex, which is literally in his front yard. I suspect Charles’ home was the original rectory for the Church. During the service, I heard a number of speakers talk of Charles and his life and times with both humor and reverence. They all told personal stories and recollections going back to his adventures in medical school sixty years ago, his time in Bermuda, marrying Carolyn, his work abroad with the World Health Organization as a much-sought-after advisor to many countries to help them implement systems of patient care quality assurance and, even more recently, as he embraced the local community in Houghton having moved there from nearby Amberly in 2008. His son and daughter, Tim and Anna, also soldiered through several evocative stories of their own.
One thing that struck me was the singing. I am not a big churchgoer, but I cannot remember ever attending a service where almost every single person in the gallery sang the hymns with such expertise in tone, perfect timing, and enthusiasm. To be fair, an announcement was made at the beginning of the service that Charles expected us to sing the hymns with gusto. The result was remarkable. It was like the entire Church was the choir!
Charles had pre-arranged a post-memorial gathering for refreshment and cheers at the George & Dragon Pub, less than a quarter of a mile west of the Church. Unfortunately, one of Charles’ more recent local efforts, to acquire funding and authority to install pavements (sidewalks) along the B2139 road that splits Houghton right down the middle, has not yet realized, so walking over to the George & Dragon from the Church was... sporting. The road is narrow but has two properly marked driving lines. The problem is that, for most of the way, there is no shoulder. But I made the walk over with a group of seven or eight brave souls and we all made it! I stayed for a family dinner after the reception and ended up walking alone back down the road to the Church (my Airbnb was just 650 feet walking distance across the street) at about 9pm. It was dark. Of course, I didn't plan ahead. I was wearing my "low-visibility" full length black wool coat and my torch (flashlight) was safely tucked away back in the room, so I set out with my iPhone’s flashlight. I hoped it would be bright enough that an oncoming driver might see me but, failing that, it would illuminate whatever bushes or embankment I would need to hurdle to get off the road in a hurry.
There were probably over 100 people who came to the George & Dragon after the service and I found myself making introductions and conversing with those near me. About an hour on, Carolyn spotted me. As busy as she was hosting family and close friends, she took special care to include me and make me feel welcomed. She introduced me to both her children, grandchildren, their parents, other relations and friends, explaining my connection to “the motorbike trip.” It seemed that everyone there knew something about “the motorbike trip,” Charles’ adventure to America in 2019 to participate in my centennial tribute to his father. They were interested to hear the “why” and “how” of it all. I explained that I had only been introduced to Charles in 2017, but that our relationship quickly flourished in an unexpected way to turn my “academic” research of his father’s trip in 1919 into a fulsome personal journey in the 21st Century... for the both of us.
As a planned small family dinner commenced (which Carolyn had graciously invited me to attend), Charles’ daughter Anna sat down next to me and thanked me for helping her and the rest of the family come to more fully know her grandfather, C.K. Shepherd. She shared a wonderful story about a Mother’s Day trip she apparently recently took to the home Charles lived in as a youth on Cranston Road in East Grinstead, Sussex, a home the family named “Drury Lodge” (apparently named by C.K. after the street in London where their family started and the origins of Charles’ middle name). Anna described the Drury Lodge of today as being huge and divided into multiple residences when she last saw it. She recalled her father telling her that C.K. had built a tree house there for her father and her aunt Claire. C.K. had included numerous elaborate technical details with pulleys and such. Many years later, when her father, Charles, built her a tree house of comparable complexity, she cheerfully just assumed that is what all fathers did. Although her grandfather C.K. passed away four years before Anna was born, she remembered her grandmother Nora who lived on until 1998. Anna had been told that C.K. was a sometimes difficult man, but she knew her grandmother as being always kind and compassionate. I internalized this as I thought about my own grandmother who perfectly balanced my grandfather who I had observed to be gruff at times. It was a lovely conversation. She again expressed her thanks for bringing their family history to life in a way that not even her father expected.
I also had a few shorter conversations with Charles’ son, Tim. He remembered our first encounter in 2017 a little differently than me. I had been searching for anyone who might have family archives of C.K.’s 1919 motorcycle trip. Although I could not find a “digital footprint” for Charles Shaw, I found one “Tim Exile,” a performance artist with substantial social network presence who I believed to be the son of Charles Shaw. Tim had a Facebook page, so I used the new Facebook Messenger app to inquire if he was C.K. Shepherd’s grandson. It was a long shot, but who knows? Tim apologized Thursday night for not responding to that Facebook message for a few days, but I told him I remembered it was something like fifteen minutes. I just looked it up. I messaged him on 6 July 2017 at 12:46 EST. He replied only an hour and a half later at 14:18 EST. So... not fifteen minutes, but not days! Maybe he had to check with Dad before replying.😀
All in all, it was time well spent with a family who has welcomed me into their lives with such grace.
And now it has inspired me to start tying up my own loose ends!
With my best wishes to the Family Shaw,
Mark Hunnibell
P.S. If you are so inclined and you have not already done so, you may make a donation to St. Wilfred’s Hospice in Charles’ name online. By the way, the photo of Charles on the donation page below was taken at the George & Dragon Pub. I know that because I had dinner on Thursday seated at that exact location facing the bar you can see behind Charles in the photo.
https://www.justgiving.com/page/charlesshaw
