Sailing in the Bahamas by Monsignor Hawes

Monsignor John Hawes painted this sailboat in about 1909 while working as an Anglican Minister in the Bahamas. He was received into the Catholic Church in 1911, and entered Beda College to study for the priesthood in 1912. Hawes must have been particularly fond of the artwork, as he packed it to bring to Australia when he left the Bahamas to work in Western Australia. Perhaps the painting acted as a reminder of balmy days and nights in the Bahamas, for he later returned to the country, where he lived the remainder of his days as a recluse. While in the Bahamas, among grander projects, Hawes designed and built a simple hermitage and chapel atop a hill, under which he created a burial chamber for himself. After his death in 1956, he was buried in the chamber as he’d requested, without a coffin, dressed in a Fransican habit, lying on his back with his arms outstretched like a cross.