Captain Matthew Flinders finally returns home

The ADF was on hand recently for the reburial of the Royal Navy captain who led the first circumnavigation of Australia.

CAPTION: Captain Matthew Flinders. Story by Lieutenant Commander JA Thompson.

Captain Matthew Flinders was finally returned to the village where he was born – Donington, Lincolnshire, in north-east England.

His coffin was rediscovered at a building site in London five years ago, prompting a campaign by locals to ‘bring him home’.

On July 13, their long campaign came to fruition. Church bells started ringing at 10am, before the coffin was carried through the village, with streets lined with thousands of people, passing a Navy guard of honour, to the Church of St Mary and the Holy Rood for a special burial service.

CAPTION: Pall bearers at the grave of Captain Matthew Flinders in Church of St Mary and the Holy Rood, as Commander Andy Swain, left, and Commander John Relyea, right, pay their respects.

Australia’s Assistant Navy Attaché, Commander John Relyea, represented the ADF at the service.

“It was an emotional one, understanding the incredible impact that Captain Flinders has had on Australia and the world. He was a pioneer whose charting skills were so accurate they are being used some two centuries later,” Commander Relyea said.

Captain Flinders was accompanied by First Nations diplomat Bungaree, who became the first known Indigenous person to also circumnavigate Australia and contribute to the mapping of the country’s coastline.

“The story of how Captain Flinders’ reburial came about is simply incredible,” Commander Relyea said.

Captain Flinders died 200 years ago, on July 19, 1814, aged 40, but the exact location of his burial site was lost in the mid-1800s.

It wasn’t until 2019, during excavations for the HS2 high-speed rail line near London’s Euston railway station, that archaeologists announced they had found Captain Flinders’ grave.

CAPTION: Captain Matthew Flinders’ tombstone, where he has been laid to rest in Church of St Mary and the Holy Rood, in Donington, Lincolnshire, UK.

They were able to confirm his remains from a lead breast plate on his coffin.

The service was held with full military honours and included an 18-gun salute before his coffin was lowered into a grave prepared within the church itself.

Also in attendance at the service were the South Australian Governor Frances Adamson and Australia’s Deputy High Commissioner, Elizabeth Bowes.

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