Hull City were playing the London club Queens Park Rangers today. I set off far too early in my silver chariot, Sir Clint, because I wanted to make a short detour in order to undertake a walk north of the village of Welton. It is situated at the southern end of The Yorkshire Wolds.
I especially wanted to snap a neo-classical mausoleum that is partly hidden by the woods that surround it. It was erected by an early nineteenth century banker called Sir Robert Raikes. Why he and his family couldn't be buried in the village churchyard like everybody else is beyond me. Perhaps he had more money than sense. Alternatively, he thought he was more important than he really was. Another possibility is that he wished to outdo his father who had established a much smaller family mausoleum in a churchyard in Woodford, London three decades earlier.
Anyway I found the mausoleum and soon afterwards carried on with my journey to the "Park and Ride" facility at Hessle on the west side of East Yorkshire's only city.
I bought a coffee, a ham and cheese sandwich and a curd tart from a branch of Cooplands on Anlaby Road. It is near our football ground. which was recently renamed The MKM Stadium. I consumed this lunch on a bench next to the skateboarding corner of West Park. I would like to say that there were some talented skateboarders in view but they were mediocre.
Once again my friend Tony sat with me to watch the match as he has often done. It was an enjoyable game. Our lads played with more self-belief, urgency and togetherness than usual They deserved their three-nil victory and each time The Tigers scored Tony and I were up out of our seats, lost in the moment. After all these years, the thrill has never gone away.
In a corner of the stadium there was a contingent of about a thousand QPR fans who had travelled up from London. As the full time whistle got close, some of our supporters sang rather tauntingly, "Back to your shithole! You're going back to your shithole!" English football is not like cricket or The Oxford and Cambridge Boat Race you know!
Quite a combination of mausoleum and football. Well , apparently the right team won.
ReplyDeleteI think you would look really cool in a Hull City shirt Red! You can order one for The Micro Manager as well.
DeleteAre Queens Park Rangers like Sloane Rangers? The Londoners probably couldn't understand the insults thrown at them because of the accents.
ReplyDeleteI think the mausoleum would make a fine henhouse. The birds could roost nice and high, out of the reach of foxes etc.
Sloane Rangers play in a rainbow coloured kit. QPR famously wear blue and white hooped shirts. I doubt that Sir Robert Raikes would have wanted chickens pecking at his bones.
DeleteThat's a fine looking mausoleum, when the trees leaf out it will be almost invisible and perhaps that's what he wanted?
ReplyDeleteActually when the mausoleum was built in 1818 it was in open ground. The trees came later.
DeleteWhat an uncouth rabble ! So unlike the language of our dear, late Queen.
ReplyDeleteI think she yelled the same words when the Duke and Duchess of Sussex went back to California.
DeleteIt makes a change from: "Who ate all the pies..".
ReplyDeleteThat's easy. It was Dave!
DeleteI don't suppose many such Mausoleums will be built these days. Shame!
ReplyDeletePerhaps you could build one on your estate in France - just big enough for you, Lady Magnon and Billy.
DeleteA male teach former friend once said in a gathering where I was present that anyone who liked football was an uncouth moron. The response disappointed me. It almost proved his point.
ReplyDeleteI have watched and enjoyed hundreds of live football matches so I guess I must be an uncouth moron.
DeleteThe mausoleum looks intriguing, with the former opening bricked up instead of a door. I also wonder what the low wall surrounding it was before; was there a fence on it, or was it the border for ornamental flower beds or a hedge?
ReplyDeleteIn your post, I particularly like the sentence „After all these years, the thrill has never gone away.“ To share such moments with your friend must make them even better.
On the low wall surrounding the mausoleum there was a low iron fence. What I find especially intriguing is that when it was built it was in an open landscape. The woods came later. I guess that in the nineteenth century it was visited frequently and was maintained. Now it sits in the woods - only seen by inquisitive ramblers or photographers like me. I would love to get inside and have a look.
DeleteGoing inside the Mausoleum for a look ?
DeleteRun for your life as Danny Baker would say.
I can see a tryst there. Catherine Earnshaw & Heathcliffe.
Cathy works at Iceland, her wee fingers chapped with the frozen chips.
Heathcliffe is a manager at Paddy Power in Sheffield.
I see a part for Lulu, an embittered Glasgow lady married to Heathie.
Imagine coming home to Lulu with a burst wages' packet !
In these days of acute housing shortages in the UK, that little mausoleum would make someone a nice little one up one down! The present incumbents are unlikely to be noisy, and might even welcome company. If you've seen some of the ads for "micro" flats with the cooker next to the bed, then this would be positively spacious.
ReplyDeleteMore money than common sense is my guess too. We had one of those over near where we live that build two pyramids in the back of a cemetery for him and his family. They probably stand 10 feet tall above ground but one can walk underneath ground level into them only ducking just a little. His plan was to be buried in the underground chamber sitting in a chair. He ended up dying first and his wife planted him in the traditional manner in a coffin, below a head stone lying flat. I'm sure there is a lesson here.
ReplyDeleteSounds like a perfect day out
ReplyDeleteThe mausoleum is a fine little eternal home.
ReplyDeleteWhen your team scores and you jump up from your seat, do you shout "Goooooooooaaaaaaaaallllllllllll" ?
ReplyDeleteI knew you were a fan of soccer/football but I didn't know you were one of those hooligans! Or did you not join in the taunting of those poor outnumbered London fans?
ReplyDelete