Over this month, the volunteers of the Cherishing Sidmouth’s Cemeteries have been uncovering several family graves in Sidmouth Cemetery.
A fortnight ago it was The Barratts, a tailoring family whose graves were cleared of vegetation. Last week it was the grave of the former Manor Steward William Hardinge Hastings and that of John Field, founder of the department store, which were uncovered.
And today in the oldest part of the Cemetery, the graves of another established Sidmouth family, that of the Goviers, were revealed and given a little respect thereby through the considerable efforts of the working party.
With thanks to CSC members Amanda and Tim O’Carroll for taking on most of this work on site. And to VGS webmaster Mary Walden-Till for putting these archive pages together.
We finish with a comment from Mary, specifically on the Govier graves:
“It seems that the part of the cemetery believed to have been long inactive had a new occupant less than 25 years ago, is this a reason to maintain levels of care in this area?”
With a photo from Amanda of the uncovered graves after some effort to clear away the brambles:
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