Eulogy Examples for Ideas, Inspiration and a Simple Structure to Follow

Giving a eulogy can seem very difficult if you haven’t done it before, and having some eulogy examples to refer to can be a great help.

I still remember giving my first ever eulogy, to my grandfather, Tom, which you can read in full below. When I first sat down to write it I was terrified, and had no idea where to start! But what I’ve learned in the years since, and through the 100 funerals I’ve since presided at, is that there are certain principles which, when you follow them, make it easy.

Here are some examples of the things you can include in a eulogy:

1. The person’s birth – when, where, parents, place in the family
2. Their childhood – schooling, their attitude to school, activities, friendships
3. College or University – what they did next, how they felt about it
4. Work – what, where, when – were they passionate, ambitious, easy going?
5. Character and attitudes – personality traits, formative experiences, how they will be remembered
6. Friends and family – special relationships, funny stories and memories, including yours
7. Marriage and children – how they met, the romance, their attitude to their children and grandchildren
8. Interests – sports, crafts, church, music, politics, etc.
9. Holidays – where, with whom, what they loved about it
10. Plans – future plans unfulfilled, and/or achievements they had

By using this kind of checklist you will quickly have enough information to write your eulogy. You can do this on your own, or you can ask other family and friends for their memories and thoughts – as well as filling in the blanks this will often turn up nuggets of information and wonderful stories you’ve never heard before, which can only add to the eulogy.

An example of what such a completed checklist might look like is given in my guide How to Write and Deliver a Great Eulogy in 6 Simple Steps, which also contains lots of other tips on how to pull it all together and deliver your speech well.

In the meantime, here as another example is the full eulogy I gave for my grandfather, Tom. You’ll see that Tom had a difficult life in some ways, and some family members had strong feelings about that, which I didn’t want to gloss over or ignore.

You’ll also see that this eulogy includes pretty much all the points on the above checklist.

“Tom was born Thomas Owen Westfallen on 29 March 1921, in Streatham, south London, the brother of Barbara, Dolly, Violet and Eric.

It’s probably fair to say that Tom’s childhood wasn’t as easy as it might have been, as money was tight, and Tom didn’t always feel loved and supported. For example, when Tom was 11 he took the “11-plus” entrance exam for the local grammar school. Before the exam, his father told him that if Tom got into the school he would have to go there in his normal clothes, as his dad wouldn’t pay for the school uniform. So the young Tom went into that exam room and failed the exam on purpose, because he wouldn’t have been able to stand the humiliation. I think the frustration he felt at this stayed with him for the rest of his life.

After school, Tom joined the Navy during the war, which was naturally a time of change and danger. I remember as a kid asking him, “What was the nearest you came to dying in the war?” and him telling me about a time when the ship was torpedoed and he ended up swimming in the water, with the sea around him ablaze with flaming oil which had spilled out from the ship’s engines. But of course he survived. He did pick up one injury though, which was to his hearing when he was standing too close to a gun when it went off. As anyone who had a conversation with Tom in the following 55 years well knows, that bang made him deaf in one ear! And it also perhaps started other problems, such as the Meniere’s disease he was diagnosed with, which affected his balance and gave him sickening spells of dizzyness, which he would sometimes control with alcohol.

Of course it was during the war that Tom met Pat, and after a brief romance they were married when Tom was on leave one time in Streatham in 1945. Like so many people of that time they didn’t get much of a honeymoon, as Tom was back on ship just days after the wedding.

A few years later, in 1950, Jocelyn was born, and in due course Laura, Adrian and Liz came along too. It may be true that Tom was sometimes distant as a father, but it’s also very clear that he loved his kids, and wanted nothing but the best for them. He desperately wanted them to have the opportunities he had been denied, and was very proud, for example, when Jocelyn passed her 11-plus exam and went to grammar school. He had no hesitation in cashing in an insurance policy especially so that, yes, he had the money to buy her school uniform. In fact, all his children did well academically at school, which is something he valued and took great pride in.

In 1954 Tom’s work in the civil service meant he got a promotion to work on the administration side at the prison on the Isle of Sheppey in Kent, which is where the family moved to, and where Adrian and Liz were born. It’s here that Jocelyn and Laura remember him building them a swing in the front garden at Chequers. And then some time later another promotion took the family to Southend, just literally a few days before I was born in 1967.

As you know things didn’t always work out between Tom and Pat, and in 1978 they separated. Painful as this naturally was for everyone concerned, it also gave Tom a chance, over time, to get to know his children in a different way, and likewise for them to get to know him. Tom and Adrian, for instance, for quite a while used to go and play snooker together every weekend.

Tom’s grandchildren started arriving with me in 1967, followed by Laura’s sons Robin, Matthew and Tom, and later Liz’s children Thomas and Holly.

And it was as a grandparent that Tom perhaps found it easiest to be warm, and he certainly made the most of his time with the younger generation. Robin and Matthew remember how he would take them to Great Yarmouth for the afternoon when they lived in Suffolk, and they had a great time. As for myself, when I left home aged 17, Tom and Adrian both provided me with much support, and Tom found me lodgings in a house across the road from him. And later, I lived with him for a while, which meant getting to know him in a totally different way, and he was always generous and kind to me, and I felt lucky to have him there.

And what of Tom’s passions? He was certainly keen on his music and both learned to play and taught himself to read music from an early age. Of course he was particularly delighted on the day, around 15 years ago, that he got his first organ, and while his poor hearing meant he didn’t always hit all the right notes, it also ensured that the music was sweet and pure to his ear, even if others had their own thoughts!

His sense of humour – loving puns and wordplays which had other people groaning – was very characteristic and something some members of the family have inherited, although opinion is divided as to whether that’s a good thing! He was also a great amateur historian, determined to learn and acquire knowledge for himself, despite the disadvantage he’d been put at aged 11. And he was an expert at crosswords, doing the Telegraph cryptic every day, often before breakfast.

And another thing which energized Tom in later years was his investments, such as buying shares and monitoring the prices daily in the Telegraph, and also splitting his house into flats and selling off the upstairs. This seemed to give him a feeling of security, of financial independence which he had perhaps yearned for all of his life, and he was, I know, glad to know that he would be able to leave some sort of legacy for his four children.

Also, speaking to Tom’s sisters and his nieces and nephews, it’s clear that Tom could be the life and soul of the party at times, and was someone they were always glad to see. And once everyone had moved away and there was no other family left in Southend, Tom realized a long-held dream when he moved down to the south coast to be near his sisters and their families. It is of course sad that the time they had down here together, all in good health and enjoying retirement, was limited by Tom’s declining health, and him having to move into the residential care home.

At the end of the day, though, how much better it is that he did make it down here, he did realize his dream and he did get to have that short time of happiness and fulfilment, being among his family again.

The recent months and weeks have been difficult for all of us, Tom included. But now that that time is at an end, one thing is sure; Tom, father, grandfather, brother, uncle, and great-uncle, you will be sadly missed.”

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