THE original gravestone of John Frost, leader of Newport’s Chartist Rising more than 180 years ago, has been brought to the city’s museum, more than three decades after the discovery of his final resting place in Bristol.

In the 1980s, Newport writer and historian Richard Frame took an interest in where John Frost might be buried, after frequent trips to Newport Museum and Art Gallery - stopping to look at a cabinet that housed the Chartist Collection, which included a photograph of Frost’s house in Stapleton, near Bristol.

Frost went to live there with his wife and daughter when he was finally allowed to return to Britain in 1856, after his banishment to Australia in the aftermath of the Rising.

“Since 1983 I’d been living on Bassaleg Road and had taken an interest in locating those people buried in St Woolos Cemetery who had played a role in the development of the town,” said Mr Frame.

“It wasn’t just those who had grand memorials to keep their names alive – I was equally interested in the dips in the ground of those unknown souls who played their part as well.

“This meant long periods thumbing through old newspapers in Newport Reference Library and seeking out their stories.

“It occurred to me that I didn’t know where John Frost was buried.”

In 1986, together with his friend Derek Priest, Mr Frame made a visit to Stapleton to search out any local burial grounds that may reveal Frost’s resting place – but they found nothing.

The answer was eventually unearthed at Newport Reference Library, in a document published in 1939 to commemorate the Chartist Rising, which included a copy of Frost’s will.

It contained the following statement: ‘I desire that my funeral be a public one and that I be buried by the side of my wife and son in Horfield Churchyard.’

“As it was a small burial ground (in a Bristol suburb), we were convinced we’d locate it easily.

“But after two hours of looking at every stone, we drew a blank,” said Mr Frame.

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In 1946 a church warden had recorded all the names from the stones, and had even drawn a location plan, but could not find a John Frost. However, there was a Henry Hunt Frost, his son.

The stone was almost unreadable but feeling around the grass they found bits of flaked stone that revealed the word ‘Frost’.

“Newport Council agreed to pay for a new headstone, and stonemasons Les Thomas and Brian Jarvis set to work by firstly removing the old stone which had almost disappeared,” said Mr Frame.

“We agreed that the new stone should be slate with a granite surround and that it was to be of Welsh stone. A trip to Carmarthen provided the slate, whilst Les was able to root out enough Welsh granite from his yard.

“The stone would include the Newport coat of arms and the names of all those buried there, and a short extract from the text of a letter Frost had sent to Lord Tredegar.

“For a couple of years, the old stone remained wrapped in the stonemason’s workshop, but in 1990 I took possession of it.

“Eventually, not being sure what to do with it, I lent it to Russell Rees in Caerleon who had planned on putting it on show in the Ffwrwm Arts Centre, which he ran.

“But Russell died and it wasn’t until this month that I was reminded about it.

“I found his daughter Rhian working in the arts centre that very morning, and later that day together with her daughter they dropped it off at my home in Baneswell.

“The story now returns to where it all began, Newport Museum and Art Gallery, and it will be there that the stone finally finds its own resting place.”