Council dug up my baby’s grave to put in a second body
Mother’s horror at desecration
A MOTHER was shocked to find that a burial plot arranged by a hospital for her stillborn baby had been shared with another child.
emma Cox, 32, was visiting the grave to mark what would have been her son Alfie’s first birthday when she made the macabre discovery.
She was astonished to find the earth churned up and decorations, flowers and even a cross bearing his name had been removed. In their place was a plastic marker with a reference number and the surname of the other baby.
Alfie had been stillborn on July 4 last year, 21 weeks into term, at Southend hospital in essex. Staff offered to arrange the free burial at Sutton Road Cemetery in the town.
But Mrs Cox, who is head of maths at a secondary school, and her civil servant husband Danny, also 32, were not aware that the grave was provided by the local authority, which has a policy of sharing babies’ plots from hospital referrals.
Mrs Cox, from Ashingdon, said: ‘I’m so angry and upset. All Alfie’s birthday flow- ers and decorations had been cast aside and his grave dug up. We had no idea this could happen. No one has contacted us at all. It was such a shock.’
After the discovery the couple went through old paperwork and found small print which stated Alfie’s grave could be shared with another baby.
Mrs Cox, who is now pregnant again, added: ‘I signed that paperwork, allowing Southend hospital to organise his burial, the day Alfie was born. We were obviously not looking at every detail and were both extremely exhausted and emotional.
‘Neither of us remember this being mentioned. What we don’t understand is why no one contacted us ahead of this happening. We would have been able to ask if there were alternative options. I am terrified of going to the cemetery next and the other family will have decorated Alfie’s grave – with no idea Alfie is there. We just don’t know what to do. I almost want to dig him up myself.’
The couple, who visit the
‘It was just like losing him again’
cemetery every week, discovered the desecration when they went there on Sunday with their son Jamie, six.
Mrs Cox, who is 18 weeks pregnant, said: ‘It was exactly like losing him again. It was just heartbreaking. We were so angry. My son just kept asking, “Why have they done this mummy?” and kept saying it was like he didn’t exist.’
The couple said the second baby was buried above Alfie’s. everything they had placed on his grave was moved and placed on a patch of grass nearby.
They will do ‘ whatever it takes’ to ensure Alfie is moved to a resting place where he is on his own again.
The policy of councils burying more than one baby at a plot is widespread, although there are no centralised figures for how many times it happens around the country every year.
In 2010 a couple from Wimbledon said their stillborn son was laid to rest in a grave that was left open for four months as another 13 babies were buried there.
Figures from the time revealed babies were being buried in mass graves with up to 30 bodies. More than 1,000 communal burials of adults, children and babies in paupers’ graves had taken place in London over the past three years.
Southend hospital has apologised to the Coxes and said it had amended its consent form to include more details about interments in shared graves.
Southend Council, which said it limited the number of babies in each grave to two, said it was considering notifying a hospital when it reopens a grave so the families can be contacted.