The memorial over the grave of Lt General Sir Henry James, Director of the Ordnance Survey, has some interesting features.

Sir Henry, apart from his work interests in surveying and map-making, was said to have a keen interest in church architecture, and in astronomy..

The window-like opening in his memorial almost certainly reflects his church interest. On the other hand, the feature of the balls arranged in a circle is less obvious to explain.

An early theory was that it represented the planets, illustrating his interest in astronomy, but a little thought shows this to be most unlikely. In Sir James’ time there were 8 known planets, so why would these be represented by 12 balls, arranged in the manner of the hours on a clock face?  In fact, there are two more pairs of such balls lower down the monument, making 16 in all.
Also, close examination of the balls shows that each has three small indentations, a feature not associated with any known planet, let alone all of them!

If anyone has a theory about what these balls represent, the archivist would be very interested to hear from you.