Friday 7 April
A lovely sunny day (7 April 2023) and Alan decided to spent a few hours in the cemetery He started working on the Crocker 7-65 grave, which is almost completed. To prevent grass and weeds growing inside the grave he felt it needed a concrete slab to be added and to help rain water drain away he decided a soak away should be added. Digging out a hole 400mm deep, he added broken bricks, tiles and small stones, and fitted a gully at the front and back of the memorial. This done all that is left is to concrete the area. He then worked on the back of the large cross which had been cleaned on the front but not on the back. With a fine wire brush he cleaned up to the ‘arms’ of the cross, the dry earth that was stuck to the cross came off nicely but was slow due to the ornate design of the cross, but he felt it was an hour well spent.
Just as he was leaving a visitor arrived looking for the Harris grave 2- 4 recently re-erected by Fine Memorials, Sue who is a member of the Friends had been following the progress on the Friends website and had come in to take a look, the headstone needs a good clean which will take place in the next few weeks..
Just as Alan finished talking to Sue, Chris walked in who came to work on a project he is interested in, locating the Well which old maps indicated was at the front of the cemetery.
Alan had a chat with Chris and they decided they would do some work on the Newswag / Cook memorial 10-46. The kerbs need to be cleaned before being cemented back into position, they spent an hour cleaning off old cement giving the kerbs a good scrub and then used Alan’s new battery power washer to see how effective this was, Chris felt it was invaluable.
Alan felt that he should make his way home leaving Chris to carry on with his investigation work finding the Well.
Sunday 9 April 2023
A full house today with Chris, Dave, Astrid, Alan & Rita doing another grand job of working in the cemetery. Astrid and Rita worked near the bottom corner of the cemetery alongside Provident Place where a large tree had recent been felled by SDC. One of the three large stumps left was completely rotten, one was partially rotten and the third was in a reasonable condition but completely covered in old ivy and bramble. The girls filled a dumpy bag of ivy, and other debris and the area has now been nicely tidied up.
The Boys went to work on the Newswag/Cook grave and cemented the kerbs back into position making outlets under the kerbs to allow rainwater to escape, particularly important as when water is trapped in the winter and freezes it can force the kerbs apart. They then filled the inner part of the grave with stone chipping. Just need to put earth around the outside of the grave to tidy up the surround.
Next stop was to move over to the Crocker 7-65 and the boys busily made up a batch of concrete to form a slab inside the front and back of the memorial stones, to prevent weeds and grass growing through. Stone chipping was added to make the finishing touch. Everyone was pleased at the way this memorial had been restored, this includes SDC for removing the holly tree that had grown up through and pushed the memorial stones over, Fine Memorial for re-erecting the large stones and cross and the Friends for cleaning and finishing off the final touches, not forgetting the generous monies raised by members and Friends for funding this beautiful ornate memorial to its former glory.
