Miserable cemetery

By contrast to Stoke-on-Trent's main municipal cemetery (see previous post), Stafford's is a fairly miserable affair. It feels abandoned and only cursorily cared-for; while its cafe (in pic) resembles a public-toilet block.
You'd have to be dead before you'd want to come here.

Cemetery as park

If Stoke on Trent does one thing well, it's its huge municipal cemetery.  The Carmountside Cemetery - built in the 1940s - is a well-planned, decorous and respectful place.  The various gardens are laid out well and attract silent browsers.
It's almost like a old-fashioned stately-house park.

Deadman in cemetery

I'm afraid I'm one of those who find cemeteries, especially older ones, endlessly entertaining.
Where else could one's sense of irony be reinforced - by finding the grave of Mr Deadman?

Mr Deadman's angel-monument in Rugeley Cemetery is curiously old-fashioned  - you'd have thought it was a late nineteenth century piece, not one made in 1944, which is when Mr Deadman died.

A year of forced remembrance

It has, of necessity, been a year tinged with sadness.  There has been so much written, said and done in connection with the 100th anniversary of the First World War that one can't do anything but be reminded continually of the miserable fact that hundreds of thousands of men - and women - died in seemingly stupid circumstances.

For many communities, it has been hard to be forced to remember the loss of life of ancestors who often died terribly young.
For families, it has been even worse. Here in Rugeley, another military grave remembers not just one young person (who died of his wounds after the war), but a young woman as well, who also died in service (in the Second World War).  Families just have had to bear it.

Jewish cemetery marks decline

One surprising aspect of north Staffordshire Jewish population statistics is that the number of Jewish families in the area has reduced from 200 to 20 in just fifty years - an decline of ninety per cent!
The reason is hard to pin down, but it could be that many of those 200 families were twentieth century refugees, and so they have just moved on again.  The community tries to be active nevertheless.

The grand old synagogue has had to be sold, and a tiny little new synagogue was built by the already established cemetery instead.  The cemetery is gated off, but has a solemn air.

Misty day in the cemetery

Misty autumn day today, though the temperatures are still in the 'mild' range.

Tunstall Cemetery runs up the side of a long hill, so the graves at its top look out over the valley.

Memorial to "benevolent individuals"

This is a most unusual cemetery memorial, as it remembers no particular person, nor does it name any individuals of this group of "benevolent" people.

It's a memorial to all those who have donated body-parts after their deaths to the local university's School of Medicine.  The main campus of Keele University is just half-a-mile from this site, Newcastle-under-Lyme's new municipal cemetery.

It's maybe unique in its dedication. I'm not sure.

This post was featured on the Cemetery Sunday website

Frozen at the cemetery

This pool at Keele Cemetery was still frozen (at least, apart from the edges) as I passed it today. Curious: as most of the snow is now gone, apart from some dirty clumps lying by roadsides. I really must brush up on my physics and discover why it remains frozen even now.

Keele Cemetery is very new; and the building in the background, which looks like a library … well... is, really!  Being all modern, it contains Newcastle Borough’s main burials-history research study-area, a community meeting room for the village (!), and offices of course – as well as the usual.
Seems a far cry from the Victorian cemeteries - where a Gothic-looking chapel/gatehouse might be the only structure apart from the graves.

German solders’ cemetery

The German solders’ cemetery on Cannock Chase is beautifully tended, it has to be admitted. Apparently, young Germans come over every year to help look after it.

Most of the bodies of the German soldiers who died in captivity, or were shot down, in the UK during the two wars were eventually transferred to here from all over the country. There are even the graves of a few German internees who also died in captivity.

Link:  German Military Cemetery at Cannock Chase