"Nipper" Parish
The catapulted boy
Nipper Parish - the one who got flipped over the roof when they were cutting the trees down. I actually saw that, 'cause I was walking down the hill and I would have hung on to the other end of the rope and been with them, but it just went before I got there actually. I just thought it was a piece of bark flying through the air. And he finished up in the back garden. He was called Nipper Parish. But when you think of the health and safety today - there was all these kids and a few adults all holding this rope - I suppose it was to stop it from falling the wrong way. And then there was quite a big funeral. (Jack Law)
The scene of the fatal accident
London Metropolitan Archives
Report from the inquest
There's a boy flying through the air
At the beginning of the Easter holidays in 1936, three workmen were felling a dead tree in Wrythe Lane. Around 100 boys were watching excitedly. Though asking the older boys to keep the younger ones back, one of the workmen encouraged some older boys to hold onto a rope, telling them to pull but let go when the tree fell. The tree fell almost immediately, the rope pulling the first boy under some railings and burning the hands of another. Someone shouted, "There's a boy flying through the air". It was 12 year old Stanley Parish whose leg had been trapped in a coil of the rope.
His mother, Mary, saw the whole thing from the front upstairs window of their home on Wrythe Lane. She heard a crack as the tree fell and saw something fly into the air. It seemed to float and then open out. A few minutes later she was called to her neighbour's backyard where her son had landed. He was taken to Carshalton Hospital, arriving at 11.15 and died half and hour later of a broken spine and other injuries.*
The funeral of Stanley Parish
Alfred Smith, Funeral Directors
The funeral
His funeral cortege on 16th April was watched by several thousand people.
Several thousand people watched the cortege.
All down Wrythe Lane for over a mile crowds lined the roadway including most of the scholars of the schools. A guard of honour was formed by the 1st and 2nd St. Helier Troops of the Brotherhood of Scouts of which Stanley was a very enthusiastic and much-liked member. They wore black armlets and stood at the salute as the coffin was borne from the house to the hearse by Senior scouts... A touch of deep pathos was given by the presence on the top of the coffin of Stanley's Scout hat. The procession halted for a moment at Winchcombe Road, close to the scene of the tragic accident and as it proceeded on its way to Carshalton Parish Churchyard a large crowd followed on each side of the road.
The service was conducted by the Rev. S.F.Tolley, priest-in-charge of Bishop Andrewe's Church, Wigmore Road, St. Helier. The internment followed in the churchyard where a large number of people not present in the church had gathered near the grave. So thick was the crowd at one point that the coffin, borne by the Scouts, was almost separated from the family mourners, who included the boy's sorrowing father, mother and sister. Strenuous efforts on the part of the police kept the crowd back at the graveside. At the conclusion of the service, many women were overcome and sobbed openly.**