Category: Burial
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Visiting the Rudston Monolith
Rudston is a tiny village in the East Riding of Yorkshire, with a population that barely exceeds 400. Yet, in its churchyard, sits Britain’s tallest…
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Bones in Brooklyn: The Journey of a Wandering Coffin
In 2015, an old coffin, complete with bones, was found dumped on a Brooklyn street. But why, who was it, and who did it?
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A Trip to Bunhill Fields Burial Ground
Bunhill Fields is a relic of London’s overcrowded inner-city burial grounds.
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Henry Trigg and the Coffin in the Rafters
Henry Trigg was an eccentric man. A wealthy and successful man. A real character. And undoubtedly, a pain in the rear to his family. At…
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The Roadside Grave of Betsy Smith, Kenilworth
The dead are everywhere. You can’t avoid them. Under city buildings and railway lines, gardens and churches. As centuries pass, memorials are removed, with the…
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Going Out in Style! Ghana’s Fantasy Coffins
Fantasy, figurative or proverbial coffins (abebuu adekai), are unusual, transient memorials, being elaborate representations of the deceased’s interests, dreams and achievements.
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Whitby’s Hidden Quaker Burial Ground
Whitby’s Quaker burial ground is impressively well hidden. To most passers-by, it looks like a garden extension to some of the more grander Georgian houses…
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“I decided to hide Charlie Chaplin’s body and solve my problems…”
On 12th December 1978, Roman Wardas, a 24-year old Polish refugee took to the stand in Switzerland, accused of stealing Chaplin’s body.
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The Curious World of Dollhouse Graves
Sitting like miniature residences between the headstones, these doll’s house graves are a striking example of non-traditional funerary art and changing ideas of grief, innocence,…
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The Hanging Coffins and Burial Caves of Lumiang
The practise of Hanging Coffins is arguably the most famous funerary ritual of the Kankanaey people of Sagada.
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The Grave of Clasped Hands: Love Conquering Death
It’s a twee little statement that love can conquer death, but one that rings romantically true in the adjoining graves of a Dutch Colonel and…
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A Trip to Brompton Cemetery
Brompton Cemetery is a sprawling necropolis, nestled in the busy – and terribly posh – London Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea.
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Collection Feature: Ernest Frost
Ernest was a country boy, raised in the fields of Derbyshire, before finding love, achieving a very modern job and dying far too young.
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The Funeral of Fireman Wale
Fire Constable Arthur Wale lost his life aged 46 in the Derham Boot Factory fire of 1906…
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A Day at Greenbank Cemetery, Bristol.
Greenbank is a large Victorian Garden cemetery, but like so many others, has suffered from years of neglect.
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Birdcage Walk: Remnants of a Bombed Churchyard
While the church is long gone, its churchyard remains, with tombs and monuments hidden behind metal railings and overgrown bushes. Although the site seems closed…
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Hudds, Huds and Hudes: Graveside Shelters of Yesteryear
Shelters may seem to have been a rather excessive addition to the world of ecclesiastical furniture, after all; what’s a little rain between a vicar…
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Timothy Clark Smith: The Grave With a Window
Instead of considering glass coffins and mausoleums, physician Timothy Clark Smith had rather more practical ideas…
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Poppyland – Churchyard Treats in the Heart of Norfolk
When travelling through the Norfolk countryside, if you were to stop at every church you passed, you’d be forced to invest in property and inform…
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Grieving Angels and Tudor Tragedies at St Andrew’s Church, Blickling.
However, in my experience, I have found so many of these tiny parish churches filled to the rafters with historical artefacts, sculptures, artwork and more…
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Victorian Iron Mummies: The Fisk Casket
Fisk’s patent explains that ‘the air maybe exhausted so completely as entirely to prevent the decay of the contained body on principles well understood; or,…
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Quaker Burial Grounds and City Centre Hermits
Beside the towering shadow of Bristol’s St Mary Redcliffe church, sits an unassuming patch of grass, surrounded by trees and overlooked by an impressively unchanged…
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Sheffield General Cemetery: The Good, The Bad and the Granite
In its relatively small grounds, it boasts ten listed buildings and monuments ‘including Grade II listed catacombs, an Anglican chapel, with the gatehouse, non-conformist chapel…
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Hidden Pre-Raphaelites and Tiny Women at Birmingham Cathedral
In the centre of Birmingham, flanked by pubs and fashionable wine bars, stands a dinky cathedral and a handful of sporadically placed headstones.
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Buried Alive! A short history of premature burial and safety coffins
Taphophobia. The fear of being buried alive. The subject of nightmares since time immemorial. With today’s modern medicine, there’s little chance of these fears becoming…
Burials & Beyond 