RootsChat.Com
General => The Common Room => Topic started by: melba_schmelba on Saturday 20 August 22 11:25 BST (UK)
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Having found several ancestors and relatives buried in public graves, usually in municipal cemeteries, they can be buried often with over 10 other people. It suddenly dawned on me, that quite apart from being able to fit people in, the likelihood of a parish or metropolitan council paying for coffins for the poor was well, not very likely. Would I be correct in thinking they would just be put in the graves in body bags in this case :'(?
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Shrouds might be a politer term!
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Shrouds might be a politer term!
I suppose so :-\!
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An interesting read
https://www.open.edu/openlearn/history-the-arts/history/social-economic-history/what-were-victorian-paupers-graves
including the following paragraph
"The grave was what was termed a deep grave and had been opened for about four weeks. The grave was what is called a pauper's grave. Such graves as these were kept open until there 17 or 18 bodies interred in them; there was only the body of a still-born infant in the one in question. It was not the custom to put any earth between the coffins in those graves, except in case where the persons died of contagious diseases and in that case some slaked lime, and a thin layer of earth, were put down to separate them."
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An interesting read
https://www.open.edu/openlearn/history-the-arts/history/social-economic-history/what-were-victorian-paupers-graves
including the following paragraph
"The grave was what was termed a deep grave and had been opened for about four weeks. The grave was what is called a pauper's grave. Such graves as these were kept open until there 17 or 18 bodies interred in them; there was only the body of a still-born infant in the one in question. It was not the custom to put any earth between the coffins in those graves, except in case where the persons died of contagious diseases and in that case some slaked lime, and a thin layer of earth, were put down to separate them."
Gawd, what an awful tragedy described in that link. Trying to fix one problem of the graves being too shallow, it seems they went to far the other way, 58 feet (17.6m) deep :o.?!! And two men lost their lives :(.
What it does tell us though is that at least in some cases, the poor did have some sort of coffins, but presumably the cheapest money could buy. But also that often the pauper graves would be left open for months until they were full up. Even in 1838 that seems to have been too much for the locals to tolerate.
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https://research.ncl.ac.uk/pauperlives/documents/SocialHistoryConferenceNorthumbriaApril8th2014.pdf
Exclusion, deviance or choice? Pauper burial in Westminster, 1725-1834
Jeremy Boulton, Newcastle University
page 13 / 44 has some basic details
"Cheap coffins and shrouds were provided for all pauper burials.
In 1817 it was ‘RESOLVED that all Coffins used after Christmas day must be made in the House; also that they be made of Deal & coloured black’. Before 1817 workhouse paupers were buried in cheap coffins supplied by local undertakers.
A burial service of sorts was read over paupers. Until 1806 this was a duty of the workhouse chaplain who was paid a flat rate fee"
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Quite a few public double oversized plots in the cemetery where many of mine are, they were placed and sized in such a way as to make the cemetery appear less crowded. Ironic that now huge swathes of it appear empty as there are many unmarked plots though it contains around 40,000 recorded burials. There are likely many more as around 20 years worth from one parish aren't recorded in the cemetery register for some reason though the churchyard in question had long since been closed.
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There is also to be taken into consideration, graves were often owned or rented for a fixed period of time. If the contract was not renewed, then unconnected people could be interred in that grave.
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Public graves and pauper graves are not the same thing. There may be some paupers in a public grave, but most of the occupants came from working families who paid their own funeral and burial costs (including the coffin). It was just that a private grave was prohibitively expensive for ordinary working people.
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Yes, I am aware that burials were/are expensive.
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Public graves and pauper graves are not the same thing. There may be some paupers in a public grave, but most of the occupants came from working families who paid their own funeral and burial costs (including the coffin). It was just that a private grave was prohibitively expensive for ordinary working people.
Thanks, I was not really aware of the distinction. I suppose in a city, space was much more at a premium. I assume in a parish churchyard, there were some small charges associated with a burial plot but perhaps nowhere near as much as private or municipal cemetery companies charged, so humbler people could afford their own plot?
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When a local cemetery to me opened in 1902, the majority of burials were in public or communal graves.
If you have access to Ancestry you can scroll through the images for Abney Park & Greenford in the England & Scotland select cemeteries dataset.
The images are somewhat distressing with the number of entries for still-born, new born infants and young children.
By 1910, you can see their weekly adverts in the British Newspaper Archives or FindMyPast, private graves £2 19s 6d and 10s for adults and 4s for children in unpurchased graves.
If you want to be buried in Kensal Green (one of London's Magnificent Seven) today, plots cost from £19,000 to £26,000 for a 50 year lease
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I Belgium, a grave is rented ,for as long as it is deemed only bones remain .
Then the family can buy the plot or if not then exhumation takes place!!!!
I remember the funeral of an old English gentleman ,whose grandson was attempting a career in cycle racing .
The family,Mum Dad and Grandad had also cone over to support him.
The old gentleman died suddenly and a very simple funeral.
Some of the English ladies there went to be supportive and translate etc .
During the interment a nearby grave which was opened ,had grave diggers bringing remains out .Leg bones ,ghastly.
It was horrible, we crowded round the small family group so they would not see as there were no screens, it was totally insensitive .
A couple of my grandmother’s babies are in paupers’ graves with twenty or so others not related.
In central Manchester near Victoria Station is Angel Meadow, the worst slum in Europe according to Friedrich Engels , Cholera was always causing great epidemics ,and next to St Michael’s Church is a communal burial ground with over 40,000 graves,multiple burials .
Mentioned in Mary Barton by Mrs. Gaskell. In “Mary Barton. “.
Very shallow as the graves got full,skulls lying about so the Corporation had it covered over with York stone flags, recently sold and it is now a grassy plot.
Thus is History destroyed!
What all those flagstones would be worth!
Viktoria.
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"I assume in a parish churchyard, there were some small charges associated with a burial plot but perhaps nowhere near as much as private or municipal cemetery companies charged, so humbler people could afford their own plot?"
This is something I hadn't thought much about. Most of my ancestors are in village graveyards, and I think it was taken for granted that village people would be buried there. Probably with no grave marker and in any available space until the last 150 years or so! There may have been a small fee, but it would have had to be small.
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Re Viktoria's post - we had a conversation recently with a German lady who lives here on that subject, it seems they do the same in Germany. It ties in to some extent with my comment about the ancestors being buried in any available space, which is what happened for all the centuries before grave markers became common, and the graveyards then started to fill up.
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"I assume in a parish churchyard, there were some small charges associated with a burial plot but perhaps nowhere near as much as private or municipal cemetery companies charged, so humbler people could afford their own plot?"
This is something I hadn't thought much about. Most of my ancestors are in village graveyards, and I think it was taken for granted that village people would be buried there. Probably with no grave marker and in any available space until the last 150 years or so! There may have been a small fee, but it would have had to be small.
I definitely think in some registers, I have actually seen the charge(s) mentioned, even itemised i.e. 'payment to vicar, verger, gravedigger etc.', perhaps in a London parish register. Sometimes in older registers I see 'affidavit made' next to most burials, but not sure what this was about!?
Below is a thread I made earlier this year about what are the oldest gravestones that are still legible that exist. I wonder if it took some time as feudalism started to end in the 14th century for enough people to become reasonably well off enough to afford gravestones.
https://www.rootschat.com/forum/index.php?topic=857072.msg7256239#msg7256239
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Re Viktoria's post - we had a conversation recently with a German lady who lives here on that subject, it seems they do the same in Germany. It ties in to some extent with my comment about the ancestors being buried in any available space, which is what happened for all the centuries before grave markers became common, and the graveyards then started to fill up.
I had a similar conversation with my German cyberpal years ago, and he said the same thing, when I asked him about my family's burial plots.
I was also trying to research 19th and 20th century German army recruits with the same surname as my ancestry but there was no trace of them at that time, although there may be in a digital database now.
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"Affidavit made" relates to the requirement (late 18th century?) that people should be "buried in woolen". Supposed to help support the wool industry.
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Just for interests sake, a few details on cost of funerals.
In 1914 when my grandfather buried his first born he paid 8s 6d for the exclusive right of burial for 14 years plus 2s for the grave sodding.
Three years later he buried his wife, the total cost for her burial was 12s 9d., (10s for the burial, 3d for the grave number stake and 2s 6d for the Ministers' fees)
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Some of my London ancestors would have been buried in public graves, not pauper graves, at the St Pancras & Islington Cemetery. They worked, so would have no doubt paid for a space and a coffin beforehand.
One ancestor died in April 1889 aged 76, and had been ill for 6 weeks by then but had been admitted to the workhouse at numerous times from 1885 to 1889. He was an outdoor army pensioner, and he was a soap boiler. Hard to know when he sorted out his burial arrangements, or if his family paid for it after he died.
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You will struggle to find "old" graves because in Belgium, graves are not preserved for eternity. "Buying" a plot is not possible anymore. That is the result of a lot of historical events in our area, with successive governments (Austrian, French, Dutch, Belgian) passing laws that led to the current situation. At one point it was possible to buy a "perpetual" concession, which of course was only affordable for the wealthy (abolished as late as 1971). Currently, a grave is kept for a maximum of 50 years. At the time of burial there is a minimum period of, for example, 25 years, depending on the municipality the graveyard is in, after which additional period(s) can be purchased to preserve the grave longer, but never "for ever". After that, the grave, the stone, and therefore also the mortal remains are removed and reburied. Only stone monuments that have a historical or artistic value are to be preserved. It was not until the 18th century that the first voices were heard to break the centuries-old link between church and cemetery. (The RC church refused to bury protestant "heretics" or buried the corpses in a corner, they also refused to bury people who committed suicide, they charged at will for burial, ceremony and mass, made as distinction between paupers and the rich(er) etc.) The eventual transition to secularized cemeteries was very gradual and sometimes not without a struggle. It is in our days the municipalities that manage their cemeteries; not the parishes. In fact, due to the density of the population, there is very little space these days to build new cemeteries and, moreover, an increasing majority of Belgians opt for cremation. A cemetery has a neutral character, and it is not allowed to make a distinction because of the faith or worship of the deceased or the circumstances leading to her/his death. The most recent law regulating the use of cemeteries and funeral services are a regional affair, thus there are decrees valid in Flanders, Wallony and Brussels. If you can read Dutch: here is the decree valid in the Flemish Community:
https://codex.vlaanderen.be/Portals/Codex/documenten/1012053.html#:~:text=Dit%20decreet%20regelt%20een%20gewestaangelegenheid.&text=Iedere%20gemeente%20moet%20over%20ten,een%20gemeenschappelijke%20begraafplaats%20te%20beschikken.