Lockwood Cemetery

Lockwood Cemetery, also known as Woodfield Cemetery, is situated between Lockwood and Netherton, and is bordered by Beaumont Park.

History

Prior to January 1898, the Woodfield Estate had been purchased for £4,750 with the intention that it be turned into a new cemetery for the Lockwood area.

The land was then sold to Huddersfield Corporation for £5,140 and it was stated that just over 23 acres of land would be used for the cemetery. A further estimated £9,000 was required for "laying out grounds, erection of buildings, sewers, etc".[1]

In November 1915, the total number of interments was recorded as 1,716, with 156 being buried in the previous 12 months. During the next 12 months, a further 144 burials took place.[2]

In May 1922, the body of a man named "Taylor" was exhumed after it had been discovered that he had been buried with the wrong name. John Henry Lodge, who lived at Taylor Hill, had suffered with paralysis and seizures for several years before dying at Crosland Moor Institution Hospital, where a misunderstanding at his admission resulted in his surname being recorded as "Taylor". When a notification of his death that was addressed to "Mrs. Taylor" at Lodge's address was returned as undelivered, he was buried in a pauper's grave at Lockwood Cemetery. At a subsequent meeting of the Crosland Moor Workhouse Committee, a chance comment revealed the error.[3] His widow and the Huddersfield Board of Guardians then applied to the Bishop of Wakefield to have the body re-interred in the family's gave at St. Paul, Armitage Bridge.[4]

In December 1937, the Corporation of Huddersfield invited tenders for the erection of "three greenhouses, potting house and heating chamber" at Lockwood Cemetery, which where built on the northern edge of the cemetery.[5]

Extracts

Jubilee History of the Corporation of Huddersfield: 1868 to 1918 (1918) by Owen Balmforth:

The Lockwood Cemetery was acquired in 1898. The estate was purchased at a cost of £5,131, and there has since been expended in erections and laying-out the grounds, &c., the sum of £7,798. Last year there were 150 interments, making a total number of 2,009. The nett expenditure for last year reached the sum of £687.

Further Reading

Gallery

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Location

Notes and References

  1. "Huddersfield County Borough Council" in Huddersfield Daily Chronicle (20/Jan/1898) and Huddersfield Daily Chronicle (16/Jun/1898).
  2. Huddersfield Daily Examiner (08/Nov/1915) and Huddersfield Daily Examiner (09/Nov/1916).
  3. At the meeting, it was noted that a delay in acquiring a coffin meant that Mr. Taylor had been buried a day late. A member of the committee had apparently known the deceased and interjected, "But the man's name is not Taylor ; his name is Lodge."
  4. "Buried in Wrong Name at Huddersfield" in Yorkshire Evening Post (20/May/1922) and "Twice Buried" in Hull Daily Mail (22/May/1922).
  5. "Contracts" in Yorkshire Post (18/Dec/1937).