Arthur Ransome
N 54° 17.877 W 003° 01.061
30U E 498849 N 6016672
Arthur Ransome was a children's author who lived in the Lake District after working as a foreign correspondent in Russia. He married Trotksy's secretary.
Waymark Code: WM3C2V
Location: North West England, United Kingdom
Date Posted: 03/12/2008
Views: 6
Arthur Ransome lived north of Nibthwaite near Lowick between 1947-9, on the shores of Coniston Water, near Peel Island, which became Wildcat Island in the book. In Cartmel, he stayed at a farmhouse called Wall Nook. In 1925 after the success of his books, he bought Low Ludderburn, near Winster.
After his death, a flourishing Society in his name was formed in 1990 and is based at The Abbot Hall, Museum of Lakeland Life and History, Kendal where there is a special room devoted to Ransome memorabilia, including his desk, his favourite books, first editions in many different languages, and the Swallow and Amazon pennants themselves. The original Amazon may be seen at the Windermere Steamboat Museum at Bowness-on-Windermere together with the Esperance, one of the prototypes for Captain Flint's houseboat.
The unnamed lake of Arthur Ransome's books is an amalgamation of Coniston and its neighbour Windermere, but it is on Coniston, close to Nibthwaite, that you will find the promontory where the Swallows planned their first expedition, and Wildcat Island, exactly as drawn in the books. Many of the incidents in the stories are drawn from Ransome's own childhood memories and fantasies. The Knickerbockerbreaker, where his trousers were worn out and darned in situ by Annie Swainson, the tickling of trout, the collecting of fox-moth caterpillars and meetings with the charcoal-burners all occurred in southern Lake District.
According to classified MI5 files released in 2005, Ransome worked for the British Embassy at the start of WWI, from 1915-17, while at the newspaper the Daily News. Ransome became friends with Karl Radek and later married Trotsky's secretary Evgenia Petrovna Shelepina. By 1918, MI5 considered Ransome a loyal British citizen, but was not convinced of the trustworthiness of his information. Meanwhile, MI6 reported that S.76 (Ransome's code name) had no special political views, and that his association with the Bolsheviks began and persisted completely by the request of the British government.
To find the headstone, walk from the road past the end of the church, and then head diagonally towards the trees or round the perimeter to the trees. Look for the granite headstone.
Description:
Author of children's literature, in particular the series Swallows and Amazons.
He was a keen fisherman as well as an author, and wrote a series of angling newspaper articles published together in his book 'Rod And Line'.
Date of birth: 01/08/1884
Date of death: 06/03/1967
Area of notoriety: Literature
Marker Type: Headstone
Setting: Outdoor
Visiting Hours/Restrictions: Daylight
Fee required?: No
Web site: [Web Link]
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