Cornet Geary Ambushed

This is the monument to Cornet Francis Geary in the church of St Nicholas, Great Bookham (near Bookham Common, where Purple Emperors fly in due season). The relief shows Geary's death in an ambush near Flemington, New Jersey, in 1776. Geary was leading a company of dragoons on a reconnaissance mission, and a band of patriots – or rebels, according to your perspective – had got wind of it and laid a very effective ambush. The unfortunate Cornet Geary was shot dead by musket fire and his body concealed, before being buried in a shallow grave.
  His Bookham monument, which is unsigned, is described by Ian Nairn in the Pevsner Surrey as displaying ' just the right combination of sentiment and ardour', its two elements – Britannia mourning over a portrait medallion, and the relief below, depicting the ambush – 'combined in a composition as elegant and as tender as an early Mozart symphony'. It's hard to disagree: in its low-key, understated way, this is one of the most touching and memorable monuments of its kind – and the relief panel showing the ambush is a quite extraordinary work of art.