Penwortham church St Mary's to exhume human remains as work takes place on crumbling walls

St Mary’s in Church Avenue has applied to the Consitory Court of the diocese of Blackburn for permission to exhume the graves, to allow repairs to be made to the eastern churchyard wall.

The works will involve the exhumation of the mortal remains of parishioners - “with some possible analysis prior to reburial”- as well as the removal and reinstatement of tombstones.

The site will also be investigated by an archaeological team, with St Mary’s seeking permission for ‘test pits’ - small trenches dug into the earth to provide a “snapshot “of any buried archaeological remains.

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The excavation will take place on the eastern side of the churchyard, where the stone wall and railings are in a poor condition and have partially collapsed.

A section of the south churchyard wall - at the entrance to the church site - will also be dismantled to allow access to the dig site before being reinstated.

The Anglican church is designated as a Grade II listed building and its oldest part - the chancel - dates back to the 14th century, while its oldest gravestone is dated 1682.

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Previous exhumations took place at St Mary’s between 2009 and 2011 when the church interior underwent significant re-ordering to install underfloor heating.

The work involved the excavation of the entire floor in both nave and chancel, where three crypts containing the remains of parishioners buried before 1856 were discovered and investigated by an archaeological team.

Skeletal remains were removed for examination and were eventually re-interred in the largest of the crypts before the new floor was laid. The crypts had lain undiscovered since the destruction of records in a fire of 1856.