Country diary: In this graveyard, not everything stays where it should | Derek Niemann

Sandy, Bedfordshire: Given a few centuries and an active population of rabbits, it's not unusual to see fragments of bone brought to the surfaceIn many a country graveyard, the dead rise up to the light after centuries down below. Six feet under is no guarantee of eternal rest, for gravediggers animal and human conspire to bring relics of the long gone to the surface. Over time, splinters and shards of deep?buried bones sometimes come out into the open.This tiny, out of the way churchyard, where interments are rare, is typical of a scene I've found in at least a dozen others in this area. Grass grows long and raggedy around tombstones of the forgotten, but is clipped short around the graves of the landowning family. The last of the hereditary line stands at the end of a row of monuments on this mown turf, his clean stone yet to take on the lichened patina of age. Continue reading...