William Wragg

In the south choir aisle of Westminster Abbey is a memorial of white and coloured marble to William Wragg. The inscription reads:

Sacred to the memory of William Wragg Esqr. of South Carolina who when the American Colonies revolted from Great Britain inflexibly maintain’d his loyalty to the person and government of his Sovereign and was therefore compell’d to leave his distrest family and ample fortune. In his passage to England by the way of Amsterdam he was unfortunately shipwreck’d and drowned on the coast of Holland the 3rd day of September 1777. In him strong natural parts and the love of justice and humanity improved by education formed the valuable character of a good man and left those who have survived him to deplore the loss of a most tender husband, affectionate parent, kind master, and warm friend. His surviving afflicted sister in England caused this monument to be erected 1779.

The memorial consists of a mourning woman leaning on a sarcophagus and on the front is a relief of the shipwreck, with the Dutch coast shown in the background. Two small figures are shown clinging to wreckage in the water. One was Wragg’s son William and the other a slave boy (Tom Skene) who rescued him - both survived. Young William died unmarried in 1803. The carved ornaments include dolphins and shells, with the infant Neptune on a sea-lion and the infant Bacchus on a lion. The memorial is signed by the sculptor Richard Hayward.

His Life

William was born in 1714 in Charleston, son of Samuel and his wife Marie (DuBose). When he was young he and his father were captured by pirates led by Captain Edward Teach (Blackbeard) and imprisoned. In exchange for an expensive chest of medicines the prisoners were set ashore. He was educated at St John's college Oxford. William married Mary Wood and they had two daughters Mary and Judith. His second wife was Henrietta and they had four children William, Henrietta, Elizabeth and Charlotte.