A small literary event that changed history

West country novelist Thomas Hardy almost didn't survive his birth in 1840 because everyone thought he was stillborn when he did not appear to be breathing. He was put aside for dead.The nurse attending the birth only by chance noticed a slight movement that revealed the baby was alive.

He lived to be 87 and gave the world 18 novels, including some of the most widely read in English literature. When he did die there was controversy over where he should be buried. Public Opinion felt Hardy was too famous to be laid to rest anywhere but the Poet's Corner in Westminster Abbey, the national shrine. He had left instructions, however, that his final resting place would be Stinsford, near his parents' graves. A compromise was reached. His ashes were interred
in the Abbey, but his heart would be buried in Stinsford, his beloved home country. His heart was taken to his sister's house ready for burial. It lay on the kitchen table. The family cat snatched it and took off for the woods. Simultaneously the two burials took place, although speculation to this day as to what was in the Stinsford casket. Some say the casket was empty, while others contend the cat, who consumed the heart, was captured and was buried digesting the heart.