This
page is about the old graveyard at Rowland's Methodist Church in Summerseat.
Unfortunately this graveyard is officially closed, and it has not been
possible to enter this graveyard for many years now, this is due to the
ground and also some of the large headstones being very unstable,
and also as can be seen in the
above photo,
it is really overgrown to the extent that it is not
possible to enter.
The old graveyard was officially closed by the Health and
Safety, due to the dangerous condition.
In 2005 I contacted the Methodist Church Council regarding having the
old graveyard renovated, so as we may once more visit the final
resting places of our dear family ancestors to pay our respects.
I did much research into what grants were available to help with
the project of renovating the old graveyard, as well as offering
to oversee the work and to work together with the Church Council
and the Health and Safety.
After being in contact with the
Church Council for over two years and having passed on the
information that I had gathered to obtain grants, etc. I became
very despondent at things just staying at the same position as
they were two years previous, and I do not believe that the
Church Council had even applied for any of the grants.
With my
disability problems and worsening health condition, I have
decided to abandon my efforts, this is such a shame after all
the work I had done in trying to get the old graveyard in a nice
condition once more.
Here is an extract from the last email I received from the
Methodist Church Council back in April 2007:
"As I have advised you previously we are seeking funding to
renovate the old graveyard. When funding has been obtained we
will, of course, set to work on the old graveyard. As a small
local Church we are limited in our fund raising and grant
raising. We have applied for grant funding but our annual
fundraising does not cover any significant spending on Capital
projects. The Church has limited funding for Capital spending and has
moved forward on preparing a memorial garden in the new
graveyard this year.
I am sure your many visitors to your web page would
appreciate knowing that we do intend to work on the old
graveyard when funding is available, but as I have stated on
several previous occasions we have many projects which require
funding and whilst the old graveyard is one, it is only one of
many."
Thank you, once again.
Kind regards
A Fairclough.
I do feel that the church could have tried to do
something, as it has now been six years since I first started
on my quest of trying to get the old graveyard sorted out.
Even though the graveyard is in such a terrible condition, I
have great pleasure in being able to list many photos, which
have been sent to me by someone who has really gone out of their
way to assist many of us that are researching our ancestors from
Summerseat, as we are now able to see many of the headstones
that are in the old graveyard, I have placed 35 grave photos
together with the monumental inscriptions on the first gallery,
and there are a further 30 on Gallery 2, then the final 29 on
Gallery 3. I do
really hope that you find these great photos of interest, and I
am sure that you are as grateful as I am, to the wonderful
thoughts of the person who has taken the time to sort these out
for me to show on this web site. This is not a full list of the
graves, as unfortunately, it was impossible to gain access to
some of them, and some of the headstones have fallen
over, and the inscriptions are face down, and so it is not
possible to collect a full photo history of the old graveyard.
There are now 94 graves listed in the Headstone Photo
Galleries,
together with the Monumental Inscriptions that I have done.
[ Headstone Gallery 1 ] - [
Headstone
Gallery 2 ] - [ Headstone
Gallery 3 ]
