Sambo's Grave

Took a bike ride out to Sunderland Point today. It is a little known back water at the mount of the River Lune nr Lancaster. You can only reach it at low tide as the road to it gets cut off twice a day. There are only a few houses and the odd fishing boat. I haven't been here for years however we used to come as children to visit Sambo's Grave. The tale of Sambo is sad one. He was a cabin boy on a slave trader and his master left him to do business in nr by Lancaster. His master never returned and being in a strange place the poor boy refuse to eat or drink and eventually died. The locals took pity and buried him in unconsecrated ground mark with a stone slab. Some time later a local clergy man placed an epitaph on his grave it reads

'Here lies
Poor SAMBOO
A faithfull NEGRO
Who
(Attending his Master from the West Indies)
DIED on his Arrival at SUNDERLAND

Full sixty Years the angry Winter's Wave
Has thundering dathd this bleak & barren Shore
Since SAMBO's Head laid in this lonely GRAVE
Lies still & ne'er will hear their turmoil more.

Full many a Sandbird chirps upon the Sod
And many a Moonlight Elfin round him trips
Full many a Summer's Sunbeam warms the Clod
And many a teeming Cloud upon him drips.

But still he sleeps till the awakening Sounds
Of the Archangel's Trump new Life impart
Then the GREAT JUDGE his Approbation founds
Not on Man's COLOR but his -WORTH of HEART.'

James Watlon Scr. H.Bell del. 1796

If you want to visit Sunderland point watch the tides.

It's recent claim to fame was that it featured as a location for BBC drama 'Ruby in the Smoke' and on 'Secret Britain'.