🔗 Share this article

Loved ones of people laid to rest in graves vulnerable to shoreline retreat state that a lack of decision on how best to tackle the problem is creating unnecessary distress about the eternal homes of their loved ones.

An Impending Danger to Historic Graveyards

The council have identified three burial grounds in the villages of Happisburgh, Trimingham, and Mundesley as being at risk of being engulfed by the sea in the coming decades.

A recent report on the issue sets out a range of possible actions, from taking no action to disinterring bodies and reburying them in more secure locations. Authorities maintain it is for the community to decide how to proceed.

“At the moment we’re in limbo. It upsets me. My parents wanted this to serve as their final resting place, but it won't be because of the encroaching sea.”

Estimates suggest at least a portion of one churchyard could be claimed by the waves in the next 80 years, but some locals worry it will happen far earlier. “In my view it’s got less than 20 years, if you look at what’s happened in the last 30 years,” one said.

Haunted by the Ghosts of Eccles

One resident remembered a school trip to the nearby village of Eccles, which has almost entirely disappeared into the water, along with its church and graveyard.

“You could see people’s bones,” she said. “Some have this romantic idea that people’s remains will just get carried away to sea. They won’t. People will collect remains as souvenirs and go plundering graves looking for treasures. That is completely undignified.”

“I fear that the same thing that befell at Eccles will happen here and there’ll be skeletons on the shore. I’d be appalled by that.”

A Paratrooper's Grave in Jeopardy

Along the coast is situated the grave of a ex-soldier who died while working overseas. His mother said she could not sleep after discovering her son’s final plot might one day be moved.

“It truly disturb me to think this won’t be his lasting resting place,” she said. “To our family it’s an significant site to visit.”

She believes, new interments should cease but says it is premature to exhume current plots. “My preference for now is to do nothing and watch carefully, but an early decision needs to be made when a critical moment has been attained.”

Searching for Answers and Certainty

An absence of agreement over when and how to tackle the problem has left bereaved families feeling frustrated and anxious.

Some want more sea defences to slow the inevitable erosion and to allow funerals to proceed for now. Others contend the moment for relocation 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 everybody is washing their hands over who is accountable.”

A coastal manager confirmed the graveyards were under the care of the local diocese. “In the end it is up to them to decide the direction to take. We are here to assist them through that process with residents.”

He added there was time to consider all the choices. “We are talking many years before it begins getting lost.”

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

The possibility of losing the churches and graveyards was described as one of “immense sorrow for the area,” but faith leaders also referenced a doctrine in resurrection, providing a spiritual perspective on the temporal disappearance of hallowed earth.