During the Temple closure for renovations we get Saturdays and Mondays off so we decided this past Saturday to take the train to Rayleigh, Essex where Elder Kiddle's Great Grandfather, Edward Benjamin Kiddle, is buried in the Rayleigh Cemetery. It took three different trains and three hours to get there. We then took bus no. 1 from the train station to the Cemetery and were delighted to find his grave and even more delighted to find it in legible condition. The headstone was still standing straight and tall. It was raining hard or we would have taken some time to clear away some of the weeds on his grave plot. We have posted a picture of the grave as to how it looked over 100 years ago when Elder Kiddle's Great Uncle Walter Kiddle was serving a mission for the church in England. We also post some current pictures of the grave and a few sites around Rayleigh.
Once we had visited the grave we did look around the Cemetery for other possible family members but found none except for some in-laws that had been added to Great Grandpa's head stone which we explain with the picture.
We then took bus number 8 back into town to look around. We saw a lovely soccer field and a few of the stores downtown. We passed a sweets store which displayed several jars of sugarless candies in their window. We went in to buy some sugarless sweets but when Elder Kiddle went to get his wallet out of his back pocket it was gone. We were horrified as it contained his driver's licence and his Canadian Visa cards and his temple recommend. It also contained our return train tickets. The lady at the candy store directed us to the police station which was just around the corner. We gave our report and they helped us contact the bus company as we felt that it was on the bus were the wallet was lost. The bus company said that they had no way to contact the bus driver and they would have to wait for the bus to return to the bus barn to look for it. We were told it would probably be Monday before they could report back to us. We said a prayer and asked the Lord to help us retrieve the wallet.
We returned to the train station. Soon after we arrived a number 8 bus came in so we asked the driver how long the number 8 bus took to make a complete circle of its route and were told 3 hrs. We decided to wait and see if the same bus we were on came in. We waited for two of the #8 buses to come in with no success. We decided to wait for one more bus. While we were waiting Elder Kiddle received a phone call on his cell phone and it was a man at the bus barn and he said he had the wallet. We were ecstatic. He said he would send a friend over to the train station with it. In about 1/2 hour the man came with the wallet. The money was gone but all the credit cards, driver's licence, train tickets etc. were still in it. We were soon on the train back to the Temple. We really feel the Lord intervened in helping Elder Kiddle get his wallet back. " Thank you Heavenly Father."
Now some pictures
The grave over 100 years ago
The Grave today (notice the rain on the camera lens)
Showing how upright the grave stone still stands and the extra names now on the gravestone.
Elder Kiddle's sister Elsa informed us that Sarah Ann Hopton was a sister of Great Grandma Kiddle (Eliza Stead (Jones) Kiddle) and was executor to Great Grandpa's estate after Great Grandma went to Utah with the children. Great Uncle Walter in the first picture was one of the children who returned to England on a church mission.
around town
The train station where we spent most of our day
Elder Kiddle's wallet now contains only his English banking card and Temple recommend and none of his Canadian credit cards and Driver's Licence.
Who would have ever thought that our mission would have included a Sherlock Holmes mystery.
Love from Elder & Sister Kiddle
