Tombstone mystery! - Ancient graves leave everyone guessing
published: Thursday | July 13, 2006

Robert Lalah, Staff Reporter

Veronica Lawrence says the entire community is confused about the tombs. - IAN ALLEN/STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER

NOW AS far as I'm concerned, what happens between a man and his donkey in private is his own business. But I must admit that I was a tad curious when I heard that so strong was the love between the man and his beast, that the two were buried together!

Eerie, I know. But the only way to find out more about this creepy story was to head down to the spot where the bodies of the man and his beloved steed are rumored to be buried.

As the story was told to me, the couple lived a long and happy life together in a lowly hut in the bushes of St. Elizabeth back in the 1940s. Yes, theirs was apparently a close bond that led the old farmer to request that his donkey be buried with him when he died. That's all I could find out, so I commissioned the help of photographer Ian Allen and headed off to a place called Tombstone, St. Elizabeth, where it is said the remains rest.

Now it was easy to tell why the place is called Tombstone. Two large concrete tombs which, it is said, house the remains of the donkey-loving man and the apple of his eye are the most noticeable things in the entire square. There is a gas station behind the tombs and a few small shops across the road. The tombs are right beside the road with cars whizzing by all day.

We hopped out of the car and walked over to a small shop where a woman was enjoying an afternoon snooze behind the counter. I cleared my throat but she didn't move. I poked her with my finger but she didn't budge. I was about to count my losses and walk away when a man wearing a torn T-shirt walked up to the counter. "Iris! Serve here!" he shouted. This jolted the woman out of her peaceful slumber. She was not amused. "Ah wah do you? Mek you so cantankerous? You nuh see mi a sleep?" she retorted.

The man requested a bottle of oil and when the exchange of money for bottle was made, he was off. "Afta mi and you nuh quabs!" Iris whispered under her breath when he was gone.

Perhaps against better judgement I decided to go ahead and ask the miserable woman about the tombstones. To my surprise, it went quite smoothly. "Oh. Well nobody know is who really bury there still. People say all kinda things still. Some say is a man and him donkey, other people say is a soldier and all kinda thing," she said.

"Some people say is a evil woman from inna olden times dat bury there and the other grave is her fandangle dem weh she use to work her evil," she said.

Two men walked up to us and joined in the conversation. They said they operated the small shop right across the road from the tombs. "Dem say is a British soldier and him horse bury there. And some writing deh pan it. But nothing nuh go so!" said the shorter of the two men. He was a stumpy little man with bushy eyebrows. The other man was tall and lanky.

"Is two man was having a drink one day long ago in a bar over there," the short man pointed across the road. "The two of them get into argument over woman business and then them decide fi have a duel," he said, using his fingers to imitate a gun.

"But in them days you never have nuh gun," he said, calling into question his finger imitation.

"Them use sword and chop up one another and is the two of them bury there 'till this day," he said with a look of satisfaction on his face.

The tall man had a look of disgust on his face. "You is a fool! Is the British soldier bury over there with him horse! Everybody know that," he quipped. As he put it, many people have seen the ghost of the soldier and his horse late at night. "Mi know people who see the duppy dem. So mi know seh is true," he said.

We decided to walk over to the tombstones to see if there were any inscriptions on them. Indeed there were, but they had faded with time and were hard to read. I did manage to decipher part of the inscription on one of the tombs though, which explained that it was indeed the burial spot for a British soldier called Thomas Spence who died in the 1700s. The other tomb had no inscription.

We met Veronica Lawrence, a heavyset woman who was wearing a long blue dress
and a pair of glasses. She explained that even though the inscriptions say that the tomb houses the soldier's remains, not many people in the community buy that story.

"People have their own story and not many people believe that it's the soldier," she said.

We soon proved the woman's statement.

As we walked around and spoke with some longtime residents of the area, we realised that we didn't get the same explanation from any two persons. Everyone had a different story.

A WOMAN NAMED MARY LEE

"Is Mary Lee bury there," one woman said. When we asked her who Mary Lee was, she stuttered. "I don't know, I only hear that is a woman name Mary Lee bury there," she answered finally.

We managed to find out that there is a popular fable that a woman named Mary Lee was riding on a horse with her male friend. The story is that she was feeling a bit, well, gassy and dropped dead at the very spot where the tombs are now.

Brother Bean, who was standing a few feet from the concrete structures, told us that he thought the tombs were cursed. "If you ever know how much car crash inna dem ting deh, and all now dem can't mash up," he said. "Mi see about hundred car and truck inna my lifetime crash inna dem and and dem still there. Mi nah waste no time a gues who inna dem, for it ago deh bout longer than me and you!"

Please send comments to robert.lalah@gleanerjm.com.

Left: It's hard to make out what's left of the inscription.   Right: The tombstones are really hard to miss. No wonder the community is named after them. - PHOTOS BY IAN ALLEN/STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER