🔗 Share this article

Loved ones of people laid to rest in graves at risk from shoreline retreat argue that a lack of decision on how best to tackle the issue is causing them unnecessary distress concerning the eternal homes of their loved ones.

An Impending Danger to Ancient Graveyards

Local authorities have singled out three burial grounds in the communities of Happisburgh, Trimingham, and Mundesley as being at risk of being consumed by the ocean in the next few generations.

A recent report on the issue details a series of options, from doing nothing to exhuming remains and relocating them in more secure sites. Officials maintain it is for the community to decide how to move forward.

“Right now we’re in a state of uncertainty. It upsets me. They intended this to be their last home, but it isn’t going to be because of the encroaching sea.”

Estimates suggest at least part of one graveyard could be claimed by the sea in the next 80 years, but some residents worry it will happen much sooner. “In my view it’s got under 20 years, if you consider what’s occurred in the last 30 years,” a farmer stated.

Troubled by the Past

A local business owner remembered a childhood visit to the neighbouring settlement of Eccles, which has largely vanished into the water, including its place of worship and burial ground.

“You could see human remains,” she said. “Certain people hold this romantic idea that people’s remains will just get washed out to sea. They won’t. Individuals will collect remains as souvenirs and go plundering graves in search of valuables. That is completely disrespectful.”

“I’m worried that the identical fate that befell at Eccles will happen here and there’ll be skeletons on the shore. I would feel disgusted by that.”

A Paratrooper's Resting Place in Jeopardy

Along the coast is situated the grave of a ex-soldier who died while serving overseas. His mother expressed she could not sleep after learning her child's grave might one day be moved.

“It does disturb me to think this won’t be his permanent home,” she said. “To our family it’s an important site to visit.”

In her view, new interments should stop but says it is premature to exhume current plots. “What I would choose for now is to take no action and watch carefully, but an timely resolution must be made when a tipping point has been attained.”

Searching for Solutions and Certainty

An absence of consensus over the timing and method to handle the challenge has left bereaved families feeling frustrated and anxious.

Several families are calling for additional sea defences to slow the unavoidable loss and to allow burials to proceed for now. Different voices contend the time for moving graves is drawing near.

“The situation is very emotive,” said one relative. “The council’s report was really good, but now there’s confusion about how it is implemented. And everybody is washing their hands over who is responsible.”

A coastal manager said the graveyards were under the care of the local diocese. “Ultimately it is up to them to choose the path to take. We are here to assist them through that journey with communities.”

It was also stated there was time to weigh all the options. “We are talking many years before it starts to be lost.”

“Currently, there exists no common view on what should happen yet. It requires productive local conversations to find the right solutions for each community.”

The prospect of the loss of the churches and graveyards was labeled one of “profound sorrow for the local community,” but church representatives also spoke of a belief in life after death, providing a spiritual perspective on the temporal disappearance of sacred ground.