21st July 2021

I’ve created this website and written this blog because it makes me happy to research the lives of those who have lived before us and bring their stories back to life.

I turned 40 this year – scary – and like everyone, I have had an ‘interesting’ 18 months or so. At the beginning of 2020, the year that changed everyone, I was working at a local preschool and whilst I enjoyed working with the children, I wasn’t sure it was what I wanted to do long term. My husband and I were due to celebrate our tenth wedding anniversary in June of 2020, our two children were aged 5 and 7. We had planned a big party for June to celebrate my husband’s 40th, my 40th and our milestone wedding anniversary.

In March 2020, after having a diagnostic laparoscopy in the February, I underwent a total hysterectomy and went into menopause overnight. I had not worked since mid-January as I was unwell in the lead up to these operations. Two weeks after having the hysterectomy, the country went into national lockdown and instead of convalescing, I was home-schooling my two children. Following some healing problems, I chose to leave the preschool but felt that I needed to do something work-wise. I spent some of June applying for new school jobs from my bed! I was lucky and found a new job quickly at a local school nursery starting in the September.

Also in June, in between applying for new jobs and home-schooling, I found HortonCemetery.org. I ‘met’ Kevin who instigated the project and was instrumental in setting it up as a charity. He guided me in how to start researching family trees on Ancestry and I cut my teeth and researched a couple of names of those buried at the cemetery. I looked at my own family tree too. I wasn’t very good at it and quickly became disillusioned.

For those that don’t know, Horton Cemetery contains burials of mental health patients, soldiers and children from 1902 to 1955. The cemetery was established as Epsom Council did not want pauper lunatics (from the Epsom Cluster of asylums) buried in the town cemetery. It was originally planned to hold 900 graves but actually holds close to 9,000. The land was sold by the Council in 1983 to a developer who has made several attempts to build on the land, all of which have been refused. The land itself is now totally overgrown and derelict. The Charity has an ambitious plan to reclaim the derelict site and transform it into a beautiful, calming garden-arboretum, with a lasting memorial and ‘book of the dead’ containing the names and details of all known burials. To raise awareness of the Charity, a small army of volunteers including myself are researching those buried at the cemetery to bring their stories back to life.

In September 2020 I started my new job at the local school nursery. I was working full time with the kids going to both breakfast and after school clubs. It was a shock to the system for the whole family, and I quickly realised when more health problems cropped up, that I had taken on too much, too soon.

So, in December 2020, as we approached another lockdown, my husband and I decided that I needed to stop working and focus on my health and our family. Lucky timing really as the schools switched to remote learning again in January 2021!

Around April time this year, I picked up with the Horton Cemetery project once more. This time however I was reviewing stories written by other volunteers before they were published on the website. I absolutely loved doing this and I learnt a huge amount about how to research those no longer living. I also helped with publishing stories on the website which is how I (sort of) knew how to create this website! I was even able to research my own story of a man who was buried at Horton Cemetery in 1909. You can find this story here.

I have found out lots about my own family too, including a relative who was a patient at Brookwood Asylum for many years until her death in 1988. I will post more about her soon.

Recently my mother-in-law moved from East Sussex to Suffolk and she is now the proud owner of a 500 year old cottage, complete with thatched roof. Next door to the cottage is St Mary’s Church. As you can see from the photo, the graveyard is in need of some TLC. I spent some time looking at the graves when we last visited. Some are from the early 1800s. So, my current research is focused on a child aged 14 months who was buried here in 1945. The story will be published soon…

I am now working part-time again, but this time from home and a job that works perfectly around the children and general family life (although the dreaded ‘ping’ is always a threat!). Two to three days a week you will find me at my desk, calling and taking calls from people wanting to book (or not book as the case may be) their COVID vaccines. My husband and I were lucky enough to be double jabbed by 30th May, thanks to a friend who works at one of the local vaccination sites. Shout out to her also for getting me my new job!

When I’m not booking vaccines, I am most likely to be found ‘looking at dead people’ as my family refer to it and I can easily wile away a whole day researching.

That’s about if for me today I think. I am very impressed if you’ve read my whole ramblings (it’s almost 16 pages FRONT AND BACK!). I’ll write again soon. In the meantime, stay healthy and enjoy the sunshine!