British Cemetery and Cremation Records from Deceased Online

This Wednesday 21st March, we celebrate the UN's World Poetry Day by looking at the famous and lesser-known poets that we've come across in the Deceased Online database The United Nations designated 21 March World Poetry Day in 1999. Observing the day, according to UNESCO , encourages all of us to, "return to the oral tradition of poetry recitals, to promote the teaching of poetry, to restore a dialogue between poetry and other arts such as theatre, dance, music and painting, and to support small publishers . . . " In doing so, UNESCO recognises, "the unique ability of poetry to capture the creative spirit of the human mind." Like family history, poetry can reaffirm our common humanity by revealing to us that individuals, across the world and across time, share the same questions and feelings. Among the very famous poets in the database are the revolutionary William Blake and feminist pioneer and chronicler of the mid-Victorian period, George Eliot ....

Next week sees the celebration of the UN's International Day of Friendship. In this week's blog, I reflect the importance of friendship by looking at some of the ways friend remember each other after death. The United Nations (UN) proclaimed the International Day of Friendship in 2011, aiming to celebrate the role friendship between people, countries, cultures and individuals can play in leading to peace. The UN encourages governments to mark the day annually on the 30th July with events and initiatives that contribute to international efforts in mutual understanding and reconciliation. As family historians, we often focus more on biological relationships than on friendships. However, our friends play a big part in our lives and some of our ancestors had companions who were more important to them than family. One problem when researching friendship in our families' pasts is that those relationships are not always recorded. There may be a reference to a friend in a will o...

Searching for South London Surrey ancestors? Bandon Hill Cemetery, Wallington joins the Sutton and Merton Collections in the Deceased Online database. Bandon Hill Cemetery, Wallington Last week  Deceased Online  supplemented its South London Collection with the full set of burial records for  Bandon Hill Cemetery , Wallington , in the  London Borough of Sutton . As the cemetery is jointly run by the London Boroughs of Sutton and Croydon , it is worth investigating if any of your relatives died in either of those areas. Bandon Hill is situated in Plough Lane, Wallington SM6 8JQ and is a working cemetery. However, today burial rights are only given for reclaimed graves where burial space remains but has not been used for 75 years. In 1900, Croydon Rural District Council opened the Cemetery in grounds of approximately 6 1/4 hectares. The records in the Deceased Online database date from 7 March 1900 and go up to 2012 . The records cover more than 30,000 bu...