I’m not a dead body – I’m just having a quick nap!

Rough sleeper attracts concern as he kips in churchyard

Surprised passers-by had to do a double take when they walked past a ‘body’ lying amongst the gravestones in the churchyard of Ashford’s parish church.

Shrouded from head to toe in a creamy brown blanket, the unusual sight certainly turned the heads of people strolling through the churchyard in the town centre or eating in the nearby Chilli Bite cafe.

Steve Salter, the KE’s Remember When columnist, took this picture at about 3.30pm on Saturday afternoon from the upstairs of the Chilli Bite, which overlooks the churchyard.

He said: “It seems it was a rough sleeper taking refuge and having a kip in the churchyard but you should have seen the looks the sight was getting from passers by!

“He was lying parallel with another gravestone and just keep covering himself over.

“There were lots of people walking past at that time of day.

“Several people went over to see if he was alright but he just waved his arms at them to go away.

“He was moving around on the ‘bed’ he’d made but seemed deter- mined to have an afternoon nap.

“At one point some bellringers even came out of the church and walked past him, without really taking much notice of him.

“He was there for about an hour but then it started raining so he collected his stuff up and went.”

The visitor probably had no idea he was actually sleeping in one of the town’s oldest sites.

The Domesday Book holds the first reference to St Mary’s, recording ‘at Essestisford, a church and a priest’, in 1086. It is thought that the first significant structure on the site was a 12th century Norman church, recorded amongst the possessions of the Priory of Horton Kirby.

Robert de Derby was the first recorded vicar in the late 13th century, around the time that the foundations of the present building were laid.

Steve Salter took this picture of a rough sleeper, who was attracting attention in the churchyard