An Old Graveyard

This is a bit of an off-the-wall post but I had to write it somewhere.

When I was a lad I had the misfortune to attend one of Manchester's less pleasant schools. It was not 'approved' but judging from the attitudes and behaviour of certain pupils and staff it might as well have been.

Anyway, our playing fields were not attached to the school. That would have been far too convenient. No, they were a good country mile away at Nell Lane. Sometimes we actually played football or cricket, but just as often as not the pitches were judged unfit and we had to run around it. It was a very big field.

Just across Nell Lane was a little cemetery. On the gates were the words 'Southern Cemetery' and I assumed it was the very earliest part of that huge cemetery, the main bit of which is just across Princess Road, a long stone's throw away. There were tombstones with names and dates but I don't recall the details. Sometimes I would venture in to collect conkers at the appropriate season - it was a rich source of this bounty.

I am very sensitive to atmosphere, and in most cemeteries, I am at the least 'alert'. That is I have a sense of being watched, of needing to be on my best behaviour. This little cemetery was positively welcoming. It was as if the souls were glad to see you. It was so old and neglected that I doubt there were many visitors.

Eventually, about 1970, this little plot was destroyed to allow for road widening, and the inhabitants were moved to Southern Cemetery (proper) with many of them crammed together into boxes. Not a trace now remains of the place where I used to collect conkers. Even the former school field is largely destroyed.

Recently I discovered that the plot originally belonged to the nearby Nell Lane Workhouse. So, despite the legend of the gates, it was not strictly part of Southern Cemetery at all.

So to whom did the gravestones belong? Perhaps some of the workhouse residents had family who gave them a proper grave. The rest, poor souls, must have been left with nothing to mark where they lay, although of course, that was no obvious to a youthful, ignorant visitor.

I gather some of the stones survive in their new location. One day I must nip down and say 'Hi, you are not forgotten.'