John Ivesmail's Essay

Naomi V. Jelish

John Ivesmail



When the Parish committee offered me the opportunity to prepare an essay detailing my recent efforts in reuniting the disparate collections of the previously unknown Gravesend artist, Naomi Jelish, I do not hesitate in admitting that I leapt at the prospect. It has been my chief intention over the past decade to amalgamate the two collections that exist - one of which has lay in my hands since the early nineties - the other, deep in the vaults of the Kent County Council Archives Library in Canterbury. My hope was that by integrating my own anthology with the 'lost' collection of the County Council - they have only recently confessed of its existence - the full diabolical extent of the tragedy that unfolded before the Jelish family in the early years of this decade may be glimpsed, if not fully revealed.

The tragic events that befell the Jelishs are well known locally though to those active outside of the Gravesham borough they may remain unidentified and mysterious (to those unfamiliar with the details of the family's disappearance, I refer you in the direction of the local press from October of 1991 and the following July). In such a mystifying case where the majority of details remain steadfastly absent and gossip emerges to fill in the colossal voids, one is left with a multitude of questions: What happened to the family in early July 1991? Could those events have been prevented if certain issues were dealt with differently? What could have become of the five children that disappeared that warm summer day? My hope was that the documents created by Naomi would proffer some answers to these questions.