ANNIVERSARIES 8 JULY 1822
The Stone of Scone, set into the coronation chair in Westminster Abbey, before its return to Scotland in 1996. The symbol of the Scottish monarchy was held in England for 700 years
Percy Shelley drowns off Italy The poet’s ship goes down in a violent storm
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ALAMY/GETTY IMAGES
he summer of 1822 promised to be a distracting one for Percy Bysshe Shelley. The poet was sojourning in Casa Magni, a bay-front house near Lerici on Italy’s Ligurian coast, where he planned to while away the days writing, seeing friends and sailing in his boat, the Don Juan. On the afternoon of 8 July, though, his plans went awry. Shelley was sailing the Don Juan back from Livorno to Lerici with his friend Edward Williams and a boat boy, Charles Vivian, when the calm seas began to squall and a violent summer storm sprang up. It seems that the Don Juan was overwhelmed by enormous waves that ripped off the boat’s stern and rudder. Two of the ship’s masts came loose and thundered onto the deck; the splintering vessel then sank beneath the waves. Shelley reportedly had just enough time to cram a collection of John Keats’ poems into his back pocket before he was swallowed by the turbulent sea. A poor swimmer, he stood no chance; indeed, all three men aboard the Don Juan were lost. Their bodies, identifiable only by their clothing, washed ashore 10 days after the storm. Shelley’s untimely and dramatic death prompted an outpouring of grief, and contributed to his posthumous fame. His eulogisers have even gone so far as to suggest that Shelley lived under the shadow of a “fatal destiny”, and that he may have prophesied his own death.
A memorial to Percy Bysshe Shelley. The poet drowned in a violent summer storm in 1822
HELEN CARR highlights events that took place in July in history
