Burial Record, odd Phrase. COMPLETED

[Gemerald]

Hello,
I have been looking at the LMA Burial Index and have come across the following phrase:

"Buried from the dead house"

under the Abode column in the entry of a child buried at 2 months old.
Does anyone know what this could mean?

I thought it could mean Mortuary, but I'm not sure.

Thanks,
Gemma

[pinot]

See this:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dead_house

           Pinot

[dawnsh]

There's another reference here

http://www.workhouses.org.uk/index.html?StPancras/StPancras.shtml

just under the 2nd map

Dawn

[Gemerald]

Thank you Pinot and Dawn.

It seems that it wasn't a phrase that was that widely used. All my  internet searches were bringing up Horror films!

Gemma

[PrueM]

My husband's g-g-g-grandmother and two of her grandchildren were killed in a house fire in Lambeth in 1873.  The (very graphic!) newspaper reports of the time mentioned that the bodies were taken to the "dead house" - there is even a picture on the front of the "Illustrated Police News" of their coffins sitting on trestles in the dead house, with various family members looking into them 

Not sure if it was just somewhere where bodies were kept while their inquest was processing, or whether there was a wider use for it.

Prue

[Gemerald]

Thanks Prue,
Wow, that certainly does sound quite graphic. It seems they were a lot less restrained in the details reported in newspapers back then!

I think curiosity is going to lead me to getting the child's death certificate in this case. His birth and death are in the same quarter, so i think it's likely he was born and died in a Workhouse.


Gemma

[pharmakon]

Dead House was an old term for a mortuary. See the Oxford English Dictionary.

[Trunkybun1]

Hi Gemerald

Came across your posts as I am researching the name Champion from Kent and this name is listed as one you are interested in! Then I saw your post about the child being 'buried from the dead house'. I am also a member of our local cemetery conservation group and we have a dead house in our cemetery. It is a windowless stone built room adjacent to the cemetery lodge where the bodies were kept prior to burial.  Don't know any more than that though...

I wonder if we share Champions from Kent?

Trunkybun

[dawnsh]

Hi trunkybun

Gemerald hasn't been online here for quite a while. If she has switched off her notifications or changed email addresses she won't know that we have posted on this topic.

You could try sending her a personal message and include the topic's url to see if she replies.

Dawn