Hi
Not sure how you would put a legal case together based on the Acts in place at present for changing the use of burial grounds - it looks more an argument on the historical importance of the remaining unbuilt on part of the burial ground and the importance to the local community and like other similar burial grounds in London it should be kept as a green space.
That would seem to need the land to be redefined as it appears to have permission to be built on as indeed most of it already has been.
'my aim is to present an argument to the Secretary of State that it was unlawful to build in a disused burial ground in 1928 and that it would be unlawful now.' Many parts of London are built on disused burial sites. It is not illegal to do so and was not in 1928/9 if the law was followed.
'Unless another statutory provision applies, the Burial Act 1857, section 25, regulates the exhumation of human remains interred in England and Wales. Section 25 provides that, if human remains are to be exhumed from consecrated ground, that is ground consecrated by the Church of England, and are to be reinterred in consecrated ground then a faculty, an ecclesiastical licence, must be obtained from the Chancellor of the Consistory Court, the ecclesiastical court of the diocese. If the remains are not in consecrated ground, or are not to be reinterred in consecrated ground, then a licence from the secretary of state of the relevant government department, formerly the Home Office presently the Ministry of Justice, must be obtained.'The burial act came into being because churchyards in cities and industrial towns had been overwhelmed by the sheer numbers of burials occurring in them on a daily basis and had become a severe health risk. Many were subsequently cleared along with their crypts and have either become green garden areas or built upon for further urban development.
Reading accounts of the state of the burial ground in 1845 (complaint to the Board of Health by one of the schools) that was certainly the case for Crossbones.
Open Spaces Act 1906 (from the Diocese of Rochester)
'Section 11(3) permits the removal of tombstones and monuments in a disused burial ground only (i.e. one no longer used for interments whether or not the ground has been partially or wholly closed for burials under the provisions of a statute or an order in council). If the ground is consecrated, a licence or faculty must first be obtained from the Bishop (section 11(4). The local authority, at least three months before moving any tombstones or monuments, must prepare and deposit for public inspection a statement of the names and dates on the tombstones to be moved; give notice of the proposals at least three times in a local newspaper and to any person known or believed to be a near relative of a person commemorated on the tombstone; and place a notice of the proposals on the door of any church attached to the burial ground.'
http://www.rochester.anglican.org/pdf_files/dac/Maintenance%20%20Old%20burial%20grounds.pdfIsabella Holmes (London Burial Grounds Notes on their history) describes 'Crossbones' in 1895
'This was made at least 250 years ago, "far from the parish church", for the interment of the low women who frequented the neighbourhood. It was subsequently used as the pauper ground and was crowded to excess. Nevertheless two schools were built in it. The remaining piece is about 1,000 square yards. It has frequently been offered for sale as a building site and has formed the subject for much litigation. It is made partial use of by being let for fairs, swings etc. It was sold as a building site in 1883, but not having been used by 1884, the sale was declared (under the Disused Burial Grounds Act) null and void.'Many poor Irish were buried there.
Taken from Graveyard London Lost and Forgotten Burial Grounds
There has been periodic building work since in the 1920s (in 1928 40 skeltons were reinterred at Brookwood Cemetery) and the 1990s when the Jubilee Line was extended ('claimed' the Museum of London removed 148 skeltons). In 2002 Southwark Council refused planning permission for three office-blocks to be erected on the remaining unbuilt part of the burial ground. The decision was over turned on appeal which means in essence that Transport London who appear to be the present owners have permission to develop the site.
The reinterment of skeltons at Brookwood Cemetery in 1928, if that did occur, would appear to show the law was being followed.
http://www.brookwoodcemetery.com/london-parishes.htmLondon Burial Grounds website
'Building work in the 1920s led to the exhumation of many bones, as did building work on the new substation for the Jubilee Line extension in the 1990s. Detailed archaeological work from this time and a general history of the ground is described in The Cross Bones Burial Ground (Museum of London Archaeological Service 1999).' The 1999 report should give some detail of the building work that went on in 1928 and the exhumations that occurred then and certainly must do so for the work in the 1990s when the Museum of London was involved.
Regards
Valda
