The picture above shows ‘The Cross of Sacrifice’, commemorating the soldiers from Hull in the Yorkshire Regiment who were killed in the Great War, sited near the centre of Western Cemetery (west of Chanterlands Avenue).
To continue coverage of the early development of Western Cemetery, Spring Bank West/Chanterlands Avenue, Hull and to repeat the point that the object of such case studies is to create a template against which the development of any municipal cemetery, anywhere in the country, may be compared as well as being interesting in itself.
Late in 1888 it was minuted (s.p.b.s) that the ‘New Cemetery’ was to be open to the public on Sundays from 1-4pm and that a ‘dozen seats with backs’ were priced-up for the New Cemetery. Given that burials had hardly started on the site, that paths had been laid-out and that ‘planting’ had taken place (the picture above shows how we today benefit from such) such provision could only have been determined on the basis that a cemetery was a recognised ‘place of resort’, a place for a walk, for fresh air and for conviviality. The point is reinforced by a list of proposed rules for the Cemetery site submitted by the Borough Engineer to the Burial Committee, one of the eight stating that the Cemetery was to be open to the public between 6am and sunset from 1st April to 30th September and between 8am and sunset across the winter months, adding that no person was to walk on the grass or interfere with the trees, plants and flowers. The propagation of the latter was, it was decided the following spring, to be facilitated by the putting-up of a greenhouse and potting shed on the site of ‘Western Cemetery’ (the first time this name was recorded).
The Burial Committee agreed to the Borough Surveyor’s rules except one, whereas the B.S. had recommended that ‘perambulators’ be not allowed in the Cemetery the Committee disagreed.
(To be continued).