Nestled in Hindhead Commons and Devil’s Punchbowl is a Grade-1 listed gravestone. Few know of the “Unknown Sailor,” an anonymous mariner, who met his demise in September 1786 at Hindhead in Surrey. His assailants met justice when they were publicly executed on Gibbet Hill the following year. According to the tale, a sailor was documented as having visited the Red Lion Inn in the village of Thursley. It was September 1786. He had been on his way back from London to rejoin his ship in Portsmouth. During his visit, the sailor…
