How Oldham will honour memory of tragic stillborn babies buried in unmarked graves

manchestereveningnews.co.uk:

Relatives of stillborn babies who were buried in mass graves without their knowledge in Oldham will finally be able to visit a lasting memorial to their loved ones.

In the coming weeks, the council will erect memorial plinths and benches in the borough’s seven cemeteries. The remembrance spaces are in response to an unmarked burial site discovered in Royton in September, containing the bodies of almost 300 stillborn children and early deaths. READ MORE: The babies treated like nothing and buried in mass graves The discovery uncovered the truth about a ‘horrible’ but common practice between the 1950s and late 1980s.

Parents were told their children would be buried with a ‘nice person’ in an adult grave - but instead, the bodies were often placed in cardboard boxes and put into unmarked graves.

The memorial stones will be inscribed with a ‘poignant verse’ to remember the ‘little children who never got to grow’. According to the council, the plinths and benches were chosen after conversations were held with several families, who have all requested privacy and confidentiality.