ww2 graveyard
Channel: spirit rescue
Date: 2022-08-28

history from google 

Not too many decades ago there was a graveyard in Rochdale. It was attached to St Luke's Church, and had probably been there since the early years of the original church, dating back to before 1552.

The first place of worship erected there had been founded as a chantry chapel for the H family, and was rebuilt by Robert H in 1640. During the 19th century it became too small for the growing cotton town around it, and so the current St Luke's Church was opened in 1862. Part of the graveyard there had to be demolished to make way for the new buildings, but a lot of it remained in place and was still used, although quite infrequently since the opening of the new Cemetery back in the 1850s.

Municipal cemeteries were a creation of the early-to-mid 19th century, and before that time burial grounds were attached to churches. St Luke's was one of several church graveyards in the town, and an 1859 list mentions burial grounds at the Wesleyan Chapel, the Baptist Chapel, the New Jerusalem Chapel, and the Independent Chapel. There are also existing burial grounds at the Church of St James.

As town populations grew over time, most of these churchyards became too full to continue in their function. The graves at St Luke's were exhumed in the early 1970s to make space for new buildings, and the remains were transferred to this Cemetery.

The 'Lancashire OnLine Parish Clerks' website lists 8,424 burial records for this churchyard, dating from 1765-1906. They can be viewed here.

The article reproduced below is from the Rochdale Observer, 20 August 1892, and describes some of the old headstones that used to stand in the church grounds