Shropshire town council seeks family members of 'unsafe graves'

A Shropshire parish council is seeking family members of two people buried in a cemetery, after finding the grave headstones are unsafe.

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Selattyn and Gobowen Parish Council says as the Burial Authority for Hengoed Cemetery, it is appealing for the relatives or grave owners to contact them “urgently”.

Sue Crow, parish councillor, said: “We are asking the relatives of John and Dora Turner, buried in grave 217 at the cemetery and Gwyllym and Gweneth Ivy Davies, buried in grave 248 at the cemetery to get in touch with us as soon as possible as the headstones on both of these graves have been classed as unsafe.

“The Parish Council will be making arrangements for these headstones to be laid flat if we have not been able to make alternative arrangements with their families by the end of this month.

“Selattyn and Gobowen Parish Council is responsible for the health and safety of visitors to Hengoed Cemetery. Unsafe or unstable headstones can cause serious injury or even death – there was a very sad case of a child being killed by a falling headstone in Lancashire as recently as 2025.

“We have a policy and programme of headstone safety testing to manage the risk from unsafe headstones to staff and visitors. Headstones that are identified as unsafe are made temporarily safe with a support and families or grave owners are responsible for arranging for headstones to be repaired within 18 months. In the case of these two graves, the headstones have not been repaired within the required 18 months.

“As we had no current contact details on file for these two families, we placed signs on the graves in August 2024 asking for family members to contact us. We also included details in editions of the Selattyn and Gobowen Parish Roundabout magazine.”

Family members of John and Dora Turner and Gwyllym and Gweneth Ivy Davies are asked to contact Selattyn and Gobowen Parish Council by phone on 01691 886502 or by email to [email protected].