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General => The Common Room => The Lighter Side => Topic started by: Isles on Saturday 25 September 10 11:53 BST (UK)
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Am I correct in thinking that at one time, anyone who committed suicide was not allowed to be buried in consecrated ground ? The event in question took place about 1943 in Scotland with reference to the local public cemetery. Does this still apply ?
Isles.
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In England an 1823 statute legalized the burial of suicides in consecrated ground, but religious services were not permitted. The Internments (felo de se) Act, 1882. removed every penalty on the burial of suicides except that internment could not be solemnised by a burial service, but the body could now be committed to the earth at any time, and with such rites or prayers as those in charge of the funeral thought fit or were able to procure.
Stan
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Am I correct in thinking that at one time, anyone who committed suicide was not allowed to be buried in consecrated ground ? The event in question took place about 1943 in Scotland with reference to the local public cemetery. Does this still apply ?
Isles.
Given the date and the use of a Public Cemetery as opposed to a churchyard a lot would depend upon who arranged the funeral and the support or otherwise of the local clergy.
If the minister/priest was supporting the family and they arranged the funeral it is likely that the service would have gone ahead as normal. If the clergy was not supporting the family the burial would still have taken place within the plot chosen by the family the only difference being the lack of clergy.
However if there were no family to arrange the burial and the local authorities took on the responsibility the burial would have been within the area known as "common ground" within the cemetery.
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Thank you both, Stan and Falkyrn, for your swift replies. I have emailed the local registrar requesting that he/she consult the records to see if there was a burial in the local cemetery in the 1940's of someone who committed suicide by drowning. Apparently the person in question refused to serve in the armed forces believing it wrong to being involved in the death of his fellow men. There appears to be some doubt as to his place of burial.
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Often a particular area of the cemetery would be reserved for such burials, also unbaptised children and so on. Not very nice!
Regards
Derby Girl
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Most cemeterys (as opposed to churchyards) will have a large area that is not consecrated - principally for non-conformists, but a suicide could easily be buried there.
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In England an 1823 statute legalized the burial of suicides in consecrated ground, but religious services were not permitted. The Internments (felo de se) Act, 1882. removed every penalty on the burial of suicides except that internment could not be solemnised by a burial service, but the body could now be committed to the earth at any time, and with such rites or prayers as those in charge of the funeral thought fit or were able to procure.
Stan
What of Scottish law? Would it be the same as English in this area? I have an ancestor who suicides in 1827 in Scotland, wondering about his burial as well.
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What of Scottish law? Would it be the same as English in this area? I have an ancestor who suicides in 1827 in Scotland, wondering about his burial as well.
Technically in Scotland people were forbidden to bury the dead in Churchyards following an edict from John Knox sometime around 1560 - (although no alternatives appear to have been proposed - given that the earliest recorded Municipal Cemetery was the Necropolis in Glasgow in 1833.)
This restriction was never rescinded but appears to have been largely ignored although every so often there were prosecutions for the "unlawful" burial of infants
Various Orders from the Church and Acts of Parliament stopped any Religious involvement in Funerals and even when the Church did relax its stance it was mainly to administer to the living rather than the deceased - the situation was also complicated by the constant splintering of the Church and the formation of new congregations. Each congregation controlled its own churchyard
Another, perhaps less palatable thought is that suicides and those dying in the Poorhouse were sometimes given over for medical anatomy classes.
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Most cemeterys (as opposed to churchyards) will have a large area that is not consecrated - principally for non-conformists, but a suicide could easily be buried there.
That's new to me - all my English and Scottish non-conformist ancestors from the late 19th and early 20th centuries are buried in our local cemetery (Lancashire), but not in any particular enclave, in fact there are others around them that are not from non-conformist families. Why this discrimination against non-conformists, who are after all Christians and surely merit being buried in consecrated ground?
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Hello
Regarding suicide and services for them, see historic attachments here ...
http://www.rootschat.com/forum/index.php?topic=769779.0
If someone lay violent hands upon themselves the Order for the Burial of the Dead in the C of E would not be used. Their Book (extracts in the link) did indicate that Unbaptised and Suicide were to be treated differently.
These are not my views, as the Bible speaks of a resurrection and we should show compassion to those affected by bereavement, including the dreadful loss of a child or those left behind affected by the suicide of a loved one.
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My 4 X Great Grandfather George HOOD died of heart disease in September 1845 certified 18 months, but was buried in the Quaker Burial Ground at Selby, as "Not in Membership". A little more information attached to the post below. His origin is unconfirmed.
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I have read in a later 19th Century newspaper about the burial of an unbaptised child was not permitted in the local Parish, forcing the parents to seek a more distant Parish who did accept two men to lower the Child into a grave, with the following terms.
The child's grave would be against the boundary wall of the churchyard
Two men would lower the child's coffin into the grave.
The parents would have to stand outside the boundary wall whilst their child's coffin was lowered into the grave.
The child's burial caused public outrage and the article indicates campaigners were insisting on a change in Statute Law regarding unbaptised children.
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I see some Nonconformists have Churchyard burials and some NC are buried in private cemeteries run by General Cemetery Companies which sprang up around 1820 - 1830 (in Yorkshire) and those like Bunhill Fields, used by non-denominational, nonconformists / dissenters.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bunhill_Fields
A really old Dissenters Burial Ground is Ballast Hills Burial Ground (goes back circa 300 years) at Newcastle upon Tyne. Although the Registers only survive back to circa 1792. However, the M.I. records taken early 1800s show it was an older cemetery where Dissenters and Nonconformists were also buried.
Westgate Hill Cemetery Company established another private Cemetery Company in Newcastle upon Tyne.
Mark
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All municipal cemeteries have a section of unconsecrated ground. Consecrated ground is consecrated according to the rites of the Church of England.
Stan
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Consecration is the formal dedication and setting apart, by a Bishop, of a church, churchyard, or burial-ground. There are legal consequences attaching to consecration, for instance a body cannot be removed from consecrated ground for burial elsewhere without a faculty.
For disused burial grounds where the site is or contains consecrated ground, management of the site must be authorised by licence or faculty of the Bishop.
Stan