🔗 Share this article

Loved ones of people laid to rest in graves vulnerable to coastal erosion say that a lack of decision over how to tackle the problem is creating unnecessary distress about the final resting places of their departed family.

An Impending Danger to Historic Churchyards

Local authorities have singled out three burial grounds in the communities of Happisburgh, Mundesley, and Trimingham as being in danger of being consumed by the sea in the coming decades.

A newly published study on the issue sets out a range of options, from doing nothing to exhuming remains and relocating them in safer locations. Authorities say it is for the community to decide how to proceed.

“At the moment we’re in a state of uncertainty. It causes me distress. They intended this to be their final resting place, but it isn’t going to be because of the sea.”

Projections indicate at least a portion of one graveyard could fall into the sea in the next 80 years, but some residents worry it will happen far earlier. “I think it’s got less than 20 years, if you consider what’s happened in the last 30 years,” a farmer stated.

Haunted by the Past

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

“You could see human remains,” she said. “Some have this romantic idea that the deceased will just get carried away to sea. They won’t. People will take bones as mementos and go plundering graves in search of treasures. That is completely undignified.”

“I’m worried that the same thing that befell at Eccles will happen here and there’ll be bones on the beach. I would feel appalled by that.”

A Paratrooper's Grave in Peril

Further up the coast is situated the grave of a former paratrooper killed while working abroad. His parent expressed she lost sleep after discovering her child's grave might one day be relocated.

“It does disturb me to think this may not remain his permanent resting place,” she said. “To our family it’s an important place to go.”

She believes, new burials should stop but says it is too soon to disturb existing graves. “My preference for now is to do nothing and closely monitor, but an timely resolution needs to be made when a critical moment has been reached.”

Searching for Answers and Certainty

An absence of consensus over when and how to handle the problem has left grieving relatives feeling frustrated and worried.

Several families are calling for additional sea defences to delay the inevitable erosion and to permit funerals to continue for now. Others argue the time for moving graves is approaching.

“It is very emotive,” a family member stated. “The official study was thorough, but now there’s confusion about how it is taken forward. And all parties is avoiding responsibility over who is responsible.”

A coastal manager confirmed the graveyards were under the care of the local diocese. “In the end it is down to them to decide the path to take. Our role is here to help support them through that process with residents.”

He added there was ample time to weigh all the choices. “We are talking decades before it starts to be lost.”

“There is no unified opinion on what should be done yet. It requires good local conversations to discover the appropriate answers for each community.”

The prospect of the loss of the historic sites was labeled one of “profound sorrow for the area,” but faith leaders also referenced a belief in resurrection, offering a spiritual perspective on the temporal disappearance of hallowed earth.