CROMWELL’S HEAD

Manawatu Times, Volume LIV, Issue 6803, 5 January 1929, Page 3

CROMWELL’S HEAD

STILL PRESERVED IN LONDON. A correspondence regarding tho facial appearance of Oliver Cromwell, recently ran in tho columns of the Sunday Times, London, having been initiated by a gentleman who wished particularly to learn the truth about tho shape of the Protector’s nose. Later Evelyn L. Few wrote as follows; “None of your correspondents seem to know that the ‘Embalmed Head of Oliver Cromwell’ is in existence and in the possession of tho family of the late Horace Wilkinson. I have myself seen it one more than ono occasion. It is never publicly showD, but as a friend of the Wilkinson family I have taken pecplo to see it from time to time. Cromwell’s hair never turned white. The brown chestnut hair is still scon and the growth of beard on the chin, as for the last few mouths ho went in fear of his life and refused to be All tho documents about this relic are with the head, and somo time next year I am hoping to be allowed to arrange for a lecture on the subject, when they will be read in full and pictures of the head shown. The head fell down from Westminster Hall 25 years after it had been there, and w'as taken homo by a sentinel. It shows the iron spike on which it had been put ,as it 'broke off below the head. It shows also two cuts where it was hacked off at Tyburn, which fits iu with, the historical accounts of’the time.”