Poet. Born at Field Place, near Horsham in Sussex. Had a habit of eloping with and then marrying 16 or 17 year olds: first Harriet Westbrook. When she, pregnant, drowned herself in the Serpentine Percy waited 2 weeks and then married Mary Godwin with whom he had been living for the previous 2 years.
Although he couldn't swim and often predicted that he would die by drowning, Shelley spent the summer of 1822 sailing on the Bay of Lerici. A storm threw him and others overboard. The bodies were washed ashore 10 days later and, in the presence of Lord Byron and Leigh Hunt, a cremation took place on the beach. Shelley's heart was saved and given to Mary who carried it with her all her life, taking it to her own grave (or their son kept it and took it to his grave, stories vary). Shelley's ashes were later buried in the Protestant cemetery in Rome.
This section lists the memorials where the subject on this page is commemorated:
Percy Bysshe Shelley
Commemorated ati
Percy & Mary Shelley
After their elopement in July 1814 the Shelleys lived here with Claire Clairm...
Percy Shelley - SE1 - blue
British History Online: "In 1932 the London County Council erected a memorial...
Percy Shelley - SE1 - Southwark
Percy Bysshe Shelley lived at No. 26 Nelson Square which formerly stood on a ...
Somers Town Mural
This mural was commissioned by the GLC in 1980 and moved to this site by St P...
Other Subjects
Alice Meynell
Poet and journalist. Alice Thompson was born in Barnes. Her paternal grandmother was an unmarried Creole. Educated with her sister entirely by their father as they lived a peripatetic life mainl...
Wilfrid Scawen Blunt
Diplomat, poet, hedonist and traveller. Born Petworth House, Sussex. Advocated anti-Imperialism, and supported Irish nationalism. Legendary womaniser, one being William Morris's wife, Jane. Married...
Maya Angelou
Author and poet. Born Marguerite Ann Johnson in St Louis, Missouri, USA. She died, aged 86 years, on 28 May 2014 at her home in Winston-Salem, Forsyth County, North Carolina, USA. Her body was cr...
Hugo Manning
Poet. Born as Lazarus Perkoff at "123 Oxford Street in Mile End Road" according to UCL Archives. His parents were Polish Jews so we believe the Mile End bit. Spent 1938 - 43 in Argentina. On h...
Leigh Hunt
Poet. Born Southgate. Named 'James Henry Leigh Hunt' after the Duke of Chandos, James Henry Leigh, who was employing Hunt's father, a preacher, as tutor to his nephew at the time of Hunt's birth. F...
Previously viewed
Kenny Hunter
From National Galleries Scotland: "Born and raised in Edinburgh, Sculptor Kenny Hunter studied at Glasgow School of Art from 1983 to 1987. His work is heavily influenced by plastic toys, in the col...
Comments are provided by Facebook, please ensure you are signed in here to see them