In the early 1970s The Sunday Times had asked readers to write in with their examples of coincidences.One historical example which several of them sent in was this -

"In 1838 Edgar Allan Poe published a book "The narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket ". At one point in this novel four men are adrift in a boat arid they kill and eat the cabin boy Richard Parker. Some 40 years later four desperate men were adrift in a boat and to survive they killed and ate the cabin boy whose name was Richard Parker.

When I told of this coincidence to two friends in 1982 I found their respective reactions interesting."That gives me the willies! ( J.Tisdall.) "I would expect that to be better known if it were true." (M.Stean.)

During 1984 I found myself becoming increasingly interested in the phenomenon of coincidence and decided to chase up this classic example.

I went to a bookshop and bought Poe's novel. On page 141 cabin boy Richard Parker proposes that he, Peters, Augustus and Arthur Gordon Pym (narrating in the first person ), who are by now the only surviving crew aboard The Grampus, should draw straws to see which one of them should be killed and eaten to provide sustenance for the others

This is done and poor Parker is the loser. Like Stean, I found it surprising that such a striking coincidence was not remarked upon more often, for in the decade or so sine I had read this in The Sunday Times I had not seen any reference to it

I bought the book in mid- November 1984. A couple of weeks later I turned up at Bedford railway station to catch the 9:50 AM. to London. I still say I was there with a few minutes to spare, but it appeared that this was one of the very few occasions in which a BR train had actually left early.

Accordingly I had to catch the 10:20. In the carriage that I got into someone had discarded a Daily Telegraph. Under normal circumstances this would never be my first choice of paper, and it had certainly been a good six months since I had looked at a copy.

On the diarist's page (I think he is called Peterborough )I spotted this -(From The Daily Telegraph, December 1st 1984.) .

SOFT CELL My recent note About the last case of cannibalism to cause a ripple in English legal circles reminds the wildlife painter, David Shepherd, that some years ago he was browsing around Falmouth's antique shops looking for an old oak door for his family home in Hascombe Godalming.

What Shepherd and his wife, Avril, came across was a door from a cell in Falmouth jail - the very door, Shepherd was told, that had closed on the two men accused of eating cabin boy, Richard Parker, in 1884.

Shepherd tells me that not only does the door still bear bars and a grille but that its main attraction was that it only cost £7 - and now guards nothing more offensive than the family junk.

One week later the family newspaper, The Guardian, was not delivered for some reason, probably a strike. In its place we received The Daily Telegraph. In Peterborough's column there was this:

AD NAUSEAM

Richard Parker would appear to be a name to avoid if one proposes going to sea. Not only were two of that name victims of maritime cannibalism- one a fictitious character by Edgar Allan POE and the other, a real life victim aboard the Mignonette 100 years ago but evidence of other Parkers now crops up.
Brian Simpson, Professor of Law at the universities of Kent and Chicago, reminds me that Richard Parker was hanged for his role as ringleader of the Nore mutiny in 1797 and another Parker died when the Francis Speight - on board which a number of seamen had been eaten-foundered in 1846.
Such grisly anecdotes are the very spice of life to Simpson who has recently compiled some "fairly ghastly" examples of man eating man for his book "Cannibalism and the Common Law".

As I observe, it is not that powerful, particularly by comparison with the unbelievable example of the three Spanish girls in your father's house all buying the book on the same day - the day, moreover, when there was a mention of this coincidence on the Television

My interest in the topic of coincidence rarely extends beyond my own examples, but this one could count as the most improbable of which I have ever heard, and I should be extremely grateful for more corroborative detail.

And there was the fact that you were playing chess on your computer when I, a grandmaster and former British champion, rang you- and I too had a computer screen full of chess writing in front of me at the time- for I was writing a chess book.

James Plaskett - East Sussex
James Flasket has since written a book about Coincidences and has his own website:

Copyright Craig Hamilton-Parker

I was very interested in the article which appeared in the Sunday Telegraph of 27 October about the cabin boy who was eaten by the crew and your experiences of coincidence.

I have to say that my husband and I do not normally buy a Sunday newspaper but my daughter and her friend were house-sitting for us while we were on holiday and the friend bought the Sunday Telegraph. I read it on the Monday and immediately felt what a coincidence when I saw the article.

My husband and I were on holiday in Guernsey staying in the Duke of Normandie Hotel in St Peter Port. On the Saturday, 26 October we were sitting at a table in the bar and on this table is carved into the wood the story of the shipwreck and the fate of the cabin boy. I was quite skeptical of this story and could hardly believe it when I read about it again in the following day's Sunday Telegraph.

JANICE ROBERTSON- Loanhead Midlothian

Copyright Craig Hamilton-Parker

I don't know if you can print this, but I write the day after I received my subscription copy of FT with the tale of Richard Parker's death by cannibalism and the coincidences which crop up whenever his name is mentioned.

Last night feeling a little under the weather, I read my FT from cover to cover, which is not my usual practice. Then I fell asleep. Also against my usual practice, I stayed in until past 11 AM whereupon I was roused by a phone call from a friend, asking me to help him compose a letter to his employer, Dudley's, with whom he is in dispute over the withholding of sick pay. After composing and mailing said letter we went along to a local advice centre in order to find out exactly what the legal position was.

During the course of the interview my pal was told that his employer. Terry Dudley, was riding roughshod over accepted legal procedures. Then we went for coffee, and a discussion on the mind set of the boss classes ensued. "Well, I reckon this riding roughshod over legal procedures is in his blood" said my friend. "This guy is into tracing his ancestors, and one of his ancestors was a sea captain who was done for eating a cabin boy without drawing lots....."

My pal wasn't a FT reader (though I reckon he will be now!) and the relevant issue of FT was not yet in the shops. I'm willing to bet this is not the only Richard Parker-based coincidence letter you receive.

As Terry Dudley must also be distantly related to the guy who ate the distant relative of Craig Hamilton-Parker, perhaps you would like to pass this on to him?

Carlton B Morgan - Newport, Gwent.

Copyright Craig Hamilton-Parker

I was interested in the cannibalism incident (FT92) in your family's history. Your account of the survivors' stay here in Falmouth is very brief, so I looked up the microfilm copies of "Lake's Falmouth Packet and Cornwall Advertiser" (the local weekly paper) in the library here. The story was very fully reported in the 13/9/1884 edition, and the trial was followed almost every week to the end of the year. (I realise that you have probably seen this material already)

The local people were very interested in the case and sympathetic towards the accused. The men appeared before local magistrates on the Monday after they landed, when they were remanded in custody until the Thursday- rather to their surprise, because they had planned to return to their homes! At the second hearing they were allowed home on bail (much of which was put up by Falmouth supporters)

The "Packet" reported: "During the (second) hearing of the case a seaman was painfully interested in the proceedings- Parker's brother. He was dressed in the usual costume of a yachtsman, with the name 'Marguerite' sewed in red on the breast of his jersey After the court was over, he came over to Captain Dudley to speak to him. Dudley extended his hand, which Parker accepted. They only had a few words of conversation in regard to the wages of the deceased, which Dudley informed Parker were at the Customs House." (Dudley's previous command was the steam yacht 'Myrtle', so there was the SS 'Montezuma' and 3 yacht names with the initial 'M' connected to the case.)

The "Packet" also reported that the memorial headstone in Pear Tree Churchyard was paid for by Mr Haskins, Engineer, of London. It was supposed to bear a copy of a photograph of Richard Parker by 'the endolythic process', but the picture in your article shows no sign of this. (The photo supposedly used was of Richard's brother William at age 17, because of their strong resemblance)

I now live in Falmouth, but once lived in Brightlinsea (and later in Ipswich), the area where two of the survivors lived. At that time I worked as a professional yacht skipper myself, and sailed several times into Southampton- happily, I never had to dine off my crew!

R J DOWNHAM- Falmouth, Cornwall

Hello Craig,

Here is a coincidence story that may be of interest. This week I borrowed a copy of your book, The Psychic Casebook from my local library. I have found the book very absorbing with lots of interesting cases. The chapter on coincidences particularly caught my attention - the true story of the shipwrecked sailors of the Mignonette. The coincidence is, that when I borrowed your book from the library, one of the books I took back, having read it last week was called ' The Custom of the Sea'. This is a new book about the wreck and survivors of the ship Mignonette.

Regards, Greg Smith. (gregory.smith@ukonline.co.uk)

Copyright Craig Hamilton-Parker

Talking of coincidences. This morning I was discussing coincidences with my 11 year old daughter who is off school for the day with flu, and not believing some of the examples I gave her, I suggested that we look on the Internet for other examples. Your story of Richard Parker who was eaten by cannibals came up and we read with interest. It refers to the fact that David Shepherd bought the door from Falmouth Jail which housed the real cannibals, for his house in Hascombe. We have just moved from Hascombe where we have lived at Hoe Farm for the last 7 years, the previous weekend retreat of Winston Churchill, and knew David Shepherd's house well as some friends of ours had purchased it recently. Needless to say, my daughter is not so skeptical now.

Regards, Tom Gordon (tomg@regraphica.com.co.uk)

Copyright Craig Hamilton-Parker

Sent Tuesday, June 10 2033 by Julian Harrow

I was reading your story about Richard Parker. I wondered if you have read Life of Pi by Yann Martel where a boy is shipwrecked on a lifeboat with a Bengal tiger called - Richard Parker. I wondered if the author new the story or is this yet another coincidence.

Julian Harrow j.harrow@talk21.com

Copyright Craig Hamilton-Parker

Sent by post 1 Nov 2003
From Sarah Monks - Hong Kong

it was a weekend in the early 70's. I was reading the Sunday Morning Herald at the family breakfast table in Sydney and saw a re-run from The Sunday Times literary competition, in which someone (your cousin Nigel?) won the prize for submitting an entry on fiction pre-figuring fact.

At that very time, I was reading Edgar Allan Poe's psychedelic Narrative of A. Gordon Pym. I had it near at hand and said to my mother "What a coincidence, this is such an obscure book!" She said an even bigger coincidence was in the trunk under the house.

It was a manuscript my father, Noel Monks, was working on at the time of his demise in 1960, when he lived in England. A war correspondent and journalist with the Daily Mail in London, he had submitted a synopsis to his publisher about The Strange Fate of the Barque Mignonette. On the inside cover he noted that Edgar Allan Poe had foreshadowed the horrible demise of Richard Parker. His story was to be a psychological exploration of what happened on the life raft.

In your web site, you mention that Arthur Koestler sponsored the 1974 prize your cousin Nigel won. I enclose a photocopy from my father's book, Eyewitness (Frederick Muller Ltd, 1955) about an incident during the Spanish Civil war when he and another correspondent helped to save Arthur Koestler's life.

Finally, you are probably aware that Yann Martel's Life of Pi (winner of the 2002 Man Booker Prize) is about a shipwreck. One of the main characters is Richard Parker, only this time the tables are turned. He is a 450 pound Royal Bengal Tiger looking for his lunch! Yann Martel, to whom this is copied, was surely inspired by Edgar Alan Poe. If I'm not mistaken, there was a dog on A. Gordon Pym's lifeboat. He was called Tiger...

Sarahmonks@netvigator.com

Sent Saturday, August 06, 2005 at 00:18:28

Here's a Richard Parker coincidence not mentioned in the article:

The Francis Speight foundered at sea in 1846. There were deaths and cannibalism aboard. One of the victims was a Richard Parker.

Here's another one:
In Yann Martel's fable like Life of Pi, 16-year-old Pi Patel (the son of a zookeeper) is trapped for 227 days on a 26-foot lifeboat with a 450-pound Bengal tiger named Richard Parker.

The latter doesn't really count, though, as a synchronicity, because Martel knew about cabin boy Richard Parker and the Poe tale.

I also use the Richard Parker story in my upcoming novel, Romancing the Raven, which explains how Poe learned about Richard Parker's demise. The answer: time travel.

All the best,
Rob MacGregor
www.booktalk.com/robmacgregor

CRAIG: I knew about the Life of Pi coincidence (see above)- Perhaps Yann Martel, knew the Poe story? The Francis Speight story is also interesting as Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket was published in 1838 and the Francis Speight floundered in 1846. Another prediction or strange synchronicity perhaps?

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