Executed in ghostly glass
QUESTION Who created the glass cushion, a memorial to the executed at the Tower Of London?
THIS sculpture, comprising two engraved circles with a glass-sculpted pillow at its centre, was created by British poet, author and performance artist Brian Catling.
His design was the winner out of five models judged by a panel whose members considered (among other criteria) how far each design showed ‘awareness of issues/ context’. It was unveiled on September 4, 2006, to replace the modest aluminium plaque and small plastic notice that once listed the names of people put to death at the Tower.
It commemorates just ten of these people: William, Baron Hastings (executed 1483), Anne Boleyn, Queen of England ( 1536), Margaret Pole, Countess of Salisbury (1541), Catherine Howard, Queen of England (1542), Jane Boleyn, Viscountess Rochford (1542), Lady Jane Grey, the Nine-Days’ Queen (1554), Robert Devereux, Earl of Essex (1601) and soldiers Farquhar Shaw, Samuel Macpherson and Malcolm Macpherson (all 1743).
After the unveiling, Catling said in a speech: ‘It has been a total privilege and pleasure to make this work for the Tower. I started this project with a poem. One that imagined itself embedded deep beneath the site of execution where microscopic traces of blood still exist, rubbing against the mythology of the compacted earth.
‘That sunken vision changed into the words that now wind around the granite disc: “Gentle visitor pause awhile, where you stand death cut away the light of many days. Here jewelled names were broken from the vivid thread of life, may they rest in peace while we walk the generations around their strife and courage under these restless skies.” ’
His poem is engraved into the larger circle, made of dark granite, while the second smaller disc of sand-blasted glass bears the names of those executed, and the arches supporting the upper glass disk allow leaves and other debris to blow through it. These symbolically reflect the arches of the chapel, where the remains of Beheaded: Claire Cooper as Anne Boleyn in a BBC show and, inset, the cushion sculpture the executed ten still lie. Catling said that although you can’t really illustrate the brutal acts which took place at the Tower of London, he hoped the memorial was a way of suggesting it.
Emilie Lamplough, Trowbridge, Wiltshire.
QUESTION Have any First Ladies died while their husband was President?
THREE First Ladies have died while their husbands were in office: Letitia Tyler (1842), Caroline Harrison (1892) and Ellen Wilson (1914).
Letitia Christian Tyler was the first wife of tenth President John Tyler (Whig, 1841 to 1845), dubbed ‘His Accidency’ by his detractors. Tyler was the first vicepresident to be elevated to the office by the death of his predecessor.
Letitia was born on November 12, 1790, in New Kent County, Virginia. The couple had eight children. Letitia died from a stroke, aged 51, on September 10, 1842. Tyler fathered more children than any other American president; 15 in all.
Caroline Lavinia Scott Harrison was the wife of 23rd U.S. President Benjamin Harrison (Republican, 1889 to 1893). Caroline was born in Oxford, Ohio, on October 1, 1832, and was a music teacher. The couple had two children.
Caroline began a struggle with tuberculosis in late 1891. On October 25, 1892, two weeks before the general election, it took her life.
Her terminal illness meant there was little campaigning. When Grover Cleveland beat Harrison in the election, it gave him the distinction of being the only president whose predecessor and successor were the same man. Ellen Louise Axson Wilson was the first wife of Woodrow Wilson, 28th President of the U.S. (Democrat, 1913 to 1921) and the mother of their three daughters. Ellen was born in Savannah, Georgia, on May 15, 1860. Like her husband, she was the daughter of a clergyman.
Woodrow Wilson grew up in a slaveowning family. As First Lady, Ellen devoted much effort to improving housing in the national capital’s largely black slums. She died of Bright’s disease (a chronic kidney problem) at the White House H on August 6, 1914. Mary Chandler, King’s Lynn, Norfolk.
QUESTION Did St Paul receive any replies to his letters?
ST PAUL’S conversion to Christianity is told in detail in Acts Of The Apostles.
Paul, then known as Saul, was a Jew who persecuted the early Christians. When travelling to Damascus, he was blinded by a divine light and heard the voice of Jesus.
He spent three days in Damascus unable to see until a Christian, Ananias of Damascus, performed a miracle to restore his vision. Saul was baptised and took the name Paul. He became just as passionate about spreading Christianity as he had been in persecuting Christians.
He wrote long letters to Christian communities explaining Christian teachings; these letters comprise 13 of the 27 books of the New Testament.
Some of these letters were like sermons with a salutation. For instance, his letter to the Romans was a series of instructions with theological insight regarding the power of the gospel for salvation.
Others were clearly part of a dialogue, for example, Corinthians 7.1: ‘Now for the matters you wrote about: “It is good for a man not to have sexual relations with a woman. 2 But since sexual immorality is occurring, each man should have sexual relations with his own wife, and each woman with her own husband.” ’
Sadly, copies of the letters sent to St Paul were not preserved, and much of Pauline scholarship is devoted to attempting to decipher the motives and meanings of his correspondents.
Jacob Reese, Carmarthen.
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