🔗 Share this article

Families whose relatives laid to rest in graves at risk from coastal erosion argue that a lack of decision on how best to address the issue is creating avoidable anguish about the final resting places of their loved ones.

An Impending Danger to Historic Graveyards

The council have identified three church graveyards in the villages of Happisburgh, Mundesley, and Trimingham as being in danger of being swallowed by the ocean in the next few generations.

A newly published study on the situation details a series of options, from doing nothing to exhuming remains and relocating them in more secure locations. Officials maintain it is for the community to determine how to move forward.

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

Projections suggest at least a portion of one churchyard could be claimed by the sea in the next 80 years, but some locals fear it will happen much sooner. “I think it’s got under 20 years, if you consider what’s occurred in the last 30 years,” a farmer stated.

Haunted by the Past

One resident remembered a childhood visit to the neighbouring village of Eccles, which has almost entirely vanished into the water, along with its place of worship and burial ground.

“You could see human remains,” she said. “Some have this idealized notion that the deceased will just get washed out to the ocean. That is not the case. Individuals will take bones as mementos and go grave robbing looking for treasures. That is completely undignified.”

“I fear that the identical fate that befell at Eccles will happen at Happisburgh and there’ll be skeletons on the shore. I’d be appalled by that.”

A Paratrooper's Grave in Jeopardy

Further up the coast lies the grave of a ex-soldier who died while working abroad. His parent said she lost sleep after learning her child's grave might one day be relocated.

“It does trouble me to consider this may not remain his permanent home,” she said. “To our family it’s an significant place to go.”

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 closely monitor, but an early decision must be made when a critical moment has been attained.”

Searching for Answers and Clarity

An absence of agreement over the timing and method to tackle the challenge has resulted in grieving relatives feeling frustrated and anxious.

Some want additional sea defences to delay the inevitable erosion and to allow burials to proceed for now. Others argue the time for moving graves is drawing near.

“It is very emotional,” said one relative. “The official study was thorough, but now there’s uncertainty about how it is taken forward. And all parties is avoiding responsibility over who is accountable.”

A local official said the graveyards were under the care of the local diocese. “In the end it is up to them to decide the path to take. We are here to help support them through that journey with residents.”

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

“There is no unified opinion on what should happen yet. We need productive local conversations to find the right answers for each community.”

The possibility of losing the historic sites was labeled one of “profound sadness for the area,” but church representatives also referenced a belief in resurrection, offering a theological viewpoint on the physical loss of hallowed earth.