A lost necropolis

They say there is no returning from the grave but that does not stop me returning to Spring Bank Cemetery with a couple of shots of its leafy summer splendour and Victorian taphophilic excess.

The Weekend in Black and White is here.

Edward Booth, fireman

On our way through Spring Bank cemetery yesterday I came across this unique memorial which I hadn't noticed before. I think I might have remembered a steam train on a gravestone. Anyhow the web is a wonderful place and after two  little clicks it provided me with this site which tells you all you need to know about the sad demise in 1906 of young Edward Booth, fireman, in a rail accident and the subsequent improvements in rail safety that followed. Thanks for this work must go to the Friends of Hull General Cemetery and to W.P. Everingham & Sons Ltd, a local firm of monumental masons.

Margot took the close up.

Slow Motion

Given the eternity that they are intended for these stones are rightly taking their time over falling down.

The theme for the first of July is 'motion'.

The weekend in black and white is here.

Young Crow

Margot took these a few years ago in Spring Bank cemetery..

O what made fatuous sunbeams toil ...

 ...To break earth's sleep at all?


The weekend in Black and White is here.

Final resting place

Usually fly tippers choose a secluded spot, a back alley or a country lane say. The depositors of this unwanted bed chose the entrance to Spring Bank cemetery on one of the busiest roads in town. Is rubbish dumping at long last coming out of the closet and into the mainstream?

Eleanor Crosses

Spring Bank cemetery has two of these Gothic iron Eleanor Cross style monuments. They are nearly identical. The left hand one is a listed monument  and both were repaired in the mid 1990's when a newspaper from 1868 was found in one of them. Originally they would have had some glazing and a funerary urn positioned within. Of course when new there were no trees and the place would have been kept clear and well maintained.

Grave offerings

It seems are the days of just leaving a bunch of flowers by the gravestone are long gone ...

Weeping Ash

Fraxinus excelsior (Pendula)

Coming up to June and every other tree and bush has been busy getting out the greenery whilst the ash seems to be still asleep with barely a bud showing. This fine specimen is on the corner of Spring Bank west and Chanterlands Avenue, in the cemetery as you can see.

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Inappropriate to say the least

Bene qui latuit bene vixit.

So you spend a bit of money buying a lease on a quiet little plot in the General Cemetery, you lay out your dead in simple plain graves with no ostentation and there you might think you'll lie, without attracting much attention, in perpetuity or at least for the 999 years of your lease. But you had not reckoned with idiots (no better word, well there is but this is a family friendly site) plonking ten foot high signs that are just an insult, a desecration if you would, of the whole ethos of the place. No doubt it'll have something to do with the pestilence that goes by the name of 'Culture' and no doubt a grant will have been obtained to create this vandalism.

I don't know who is responsible for this and I can find no record of any planning permission being sought or granted so it's all a bit of a mystery.

Funerary Angel

It's been a while since I posted anything for the taphophiles amongst you. Here is the final resting place of one William Henry Smith who died in 1900 aged 48. This angel in Spring Bank General Cemetery has featured before a few years ago in a rear view here.

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Bring out your dead

I mentioned so time ago that the old burial ground of Holy Trinity church on Castle Street stood in the way of proposed improvements and that a large portion of it would have to cleared. People were asked to make contact with the authorities if their ancestors were interred in here. Anyhow some work has started, all hidden behind a whopping high fence. However they forgot about the bit where the old wall stands so it's possible to hold a camera over and take a sneaky peek. They've cleared the gravestones and some kind of drill is in place. Clearly this has done irreparable damage to the place. At least the trees are still standing, hopefully the bat roost is undisturbed.

Now all this might be deemed fit and proper; clearing ground for development and so on, if the proposed road scheme were just itching to start. But, and this comes as absolutely no surprise, there is still no planning application in place and the Highways Agency now claims there are environmental issues it has to overcome. The start date is pushed back to 2020 or even later ... or never. I let you draw your own conclusion about the announcement of this further delay coming just after the recent election. You get the feeling we'll all be dead in our graves before this is started.

PS. I should add that all the exhumed bones will be reburied in an unspoilt part of the graveyard. And this from the local paper is advice to anyone who thinks their ancestors may be buried there to call the project team on 0113 2836805 or email A63castlestreet.hull@highways.gsi.gov.uk

Signs of ageing

 

Lichenometry, a way of telling the age of exposed rocks by studying the size of lichens, is, I'm told, particularly useful on specimens under 500 years old. However I think I can accurately date this stone to sometime in or about March 1859 this being the date inscribed on the grave of one John Oxtoby late of Hull Bank¹ who, we are informed, departed this life aged 55 on the 21^st of that month.

The new month's theme for City Daily Photo is ageing or aging depending which part of the world you come from. You can see how well others have aged or agd here.

¹ Hull Bank I have found was a " a hamlet in the township and parish of Cottingham; the seat of Benjamin Blades Haworth, Esq. (which explains the Haworth Arms right on the corner of this estate) 3 miles from Hull". Hull Bank was mentioned in the Domesday Book and was part of the Manor of Cottingham, roughly bounded by Clough Road, Beverley Road, the River Hull and Dunswell. The area became part of Hull with the boundary extension of 1882.

The British way of death

Northern Cemetery Chapel, Chanterlands Avenue, Hull

People, it appears, can no longer afford to die. Yes I know they keep on shuffling off without a care but those left behind are finding it increasingly difficult to pay for disposing of the earthly remains. The average cost of dying, that's including funeral, burial or cremation and state administration, rose last year by over 7% to £7,622 if you believe a survey by an insurance company although that does seem rather a lot. That figure is greater than average savings so you can see how it might distress the bereaved to get into debt over this matter. Clearly someone is making a pile (dare I say they are making a killing, why not?) out of all this; undertakers' mark-ups on coffins, for example, are  reputed to be 200%!. Then there's deeds of grant (£25 a year, minimum 10 years payable in advance) and interment fees, in Hull that's currently £820! And don't get me talking about wreaths and flowers!  Still you don't have to fork out all that; there are cut price jobs for under £1000. If you own your own patch of garden you can always go under the roses wrapped in a blanket for that stay-at-home interment, just make sure you're at least two foot under the sod. 

The chapel here is a grade 2 listed building from the early 1900's, it'll cost you a £70 'chapel fee' to hire it! Have a nice day!

The Bells of Hell go ting-a-ling-a-ling

Oh! Death, where is thy sting-a-ling-a-ling? 

Oh! Grave, thy victory? 

The Bells of Hell go ting-a-ling-a-ling 

For you but not for me.

For those who believe in such things November starts in such cheery way with its two days of the dead. So yesterday all the Saints went marching in as it were, the officer class of the holy hierarchy, a Holy Day of Obligation, fasting and abstinence. Today it's the turn of the poor bloody infantry that is to say anyone else who has ever died, and, as I recall (and it's been a long, long time since this nonsense was forced on me), you can take this one or leave it as you like. As with so many Christian events this is just a take over of pre-existing pagan rites, the beginning of November being the Celtic festival of the dead, Samhain. These two days go largely unnoticed in this country, Hallow'een being a commercial thing and well, who does all that religion stuff these days? But in other parts, I'm thinking Mexico, they throw a three day party with much macabre merriment. I think maybe we're missing out.

The Weekend in Black and White is here.

Autumn Cemetery

Western Cemetery, Chanterlands Avenue

I always think these places look at their best in Autumn with a good scattering of leaves and the tree branches just beginning to show through. Another year to cross off ...

Lurkin' Toad

If you're taking a short cut through the cemetery and get that feeling of something not quite right it might just be that giant toad that you glimpsed out of the corner of your eye ...

The Weekend in Black and White is here.

Cemetery Road

You might think that old bones could rest in peace without being troubled by the progress of the modern world. Well you need to think again. Here's Holy Trinity's burial ground on Castle Street, in use from 1784 to 1861 to take what might be called the overflow from HT's churchyard. It's a bit of a rundown neglected place often the haunt of drunks, drug addicts and the flotsam and jetsam of humanity. Many of the brick vaults are falling down, tombstones now lie strewn on the ground and ivy flourishes as it should in these places. In short it's how you'd expect a cemetery to be that hasn't been used for over a hundred and fifty years. Now the place is doomed to be cut in half by the proposed Castle Street improvements which will rip through what you see here. Up to 11,000 burials might be affected and they will all have to be exhumed and reburied elsewhere. It's reckoned it take over a year just to do this. Oh and say goodbye to the trees (and the roosting bats that live here) as well.

The Simpsons

Not Springfield, I'm afraid, but Spring Bank. 

Lambert

I'm wondering, in that way that means I really don't care either way, whether this is the Lambert that Lambert Street is named after. I'm also mildly puzzled how such a heavy tombstone could get shifted. Either we have very strong vandals or Mr Lambert has been trying to get out ...