'Mass grave' suspected at Astley Bridge Cemetery, Bolton

This comes after a similar discovery in Oldham prompted a member of the public to suspect that the same kind of burial site could exist at Astley Bridge Cemetery on Eden Street.

Now Bolton Council cabinet member for the environment Cllr Richard Silvester has confirmed he has been told that this could be the case.

Cllr Silvester said: “Officers have recently briefed me regarding this possibility and to be honest I would not be surprised if this was the case because we know at other locations in the borough, that this did occur. 

“Going back 10 years to 2014 when my colleague Cllr Martin Donaghy was Mayor of the Borough, we had a ceremony at Bolton Hospital at the location of one such mass grave, where those buried were near to the site of the former workhouse.

A ceremony was held to mark the restoration of the gravestone at Ridgmont Cemetery in 2016 (Image: Public)

“They were called paupers and so that grave site was known as the pauper's graveyard.

“The ceremony changed that name and all buried were officially recognised as citizens and not paupers.

“It was one of his Mayoral initiatives of his year in office and quite rightly so. 

“A ceremony also occurred at Ridgmont Cemetery in Horwich which has another mass grave and whereby all those who are buried there are now citizens and not paupers.

“I attended both of those ceremonies at the time and if it is found by my officers that we do have more mass graves in any of the Borough's cemeteries, then I would like all those buried to be recognised as citizens.

“Unfortunately, it's a thing which occurred in history, but in the present, we can try and right a wrong from the past, and I strongly believe that we should, and I await my officers coming back to me with their findings.”

Historically burying stillborn children in mass burial sites had been standard practice for British hospitals.

Until the mid-1980s they were often taken from their parents, who would not know where they were taken, without consultation.

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Longer ago, in the 19th century, workhouse residents were often buried in mass burial sites in what were known as "paupers’ graves.”

These were graves paid for at public expense because the families could not afford them.

The mass grave that was discovered in Oldham in September is believed to have contained the bodies of 145 stillborn children, 128 babies and young children and 29 adults.

Later that month, Oldham Council announced that it planned to create memorials to still born babies buried at that and other mass graves around the borough.