To place flowers on the grave of someone I don't know?

[ChocChipOwl]

There's a back story of course. I'm not a random weirdo!

My DH thinks I'm mad but I think this is a nice thing to do.

I like researching social and local history and I'll do it for the various places I've lived. I'll use online searches etc and research a place / person and it's all quite interesting

Anyway, I live in a very small village and was researching a local house when I found a postcard dated 1915 which was sent to a lady who lived round the corner from me. I researched more on her, the area etc

She died in 1917 and is buried 0.2 miles from my house in the churchyard

I've now finished this particular research and wanted to put some flowers on her grave. She has no living relatives as her daughters were both 'spinsters'

Only a three quid bunch of tulips. My husband thinks bonkers but I think just a nice token of .. appreciation? Esteem? Not sure

I'd remove them in a week so nothing festering in there

So. A weirdo? Or nice?

I don't think I'll plant anything as that feels like a bit of an overstep to me.

It's a small churchyard with only about 20 graves. I'm working today but locally to where I live and I'm in and out on appointments but hoping to whizz up there if I have a spare ten mins - I'll see if I can find the grave first!

Why is it pointless to do something that pleases yourself and gives you a bit of closure? And it certainly won't be pointless if you take some flowers or seeds to plant.

We discovered the location of a great great uncle's WWI grave in France. No one had ever visited it before my mum and dad did. As the graves there are well tended the stone was beautiful, but bare. The flowers my mum and dad laid were the first ever laid on him. He was 18 when he died. I think if they'd got there and found other flowers it would have been nice to know he had been acknowledged in his many years of rest even if it was clearly not from a family member. I often see videos of people cleaning up stones and think its a wonderful thing to do even if that person has been dead a long time. It hurts no one.

I didn't know Mrs Bedingfeld but from one postcard, I learned what she did, where her house was (main point to me, I like social history) and from there, her two daughters, her husband etc etc. Where she went in the village.

I've had to stop because I could go on forever! So just feels like a very personal way of saying 'you lived, you mattered and how strange that someone, 106 years later, is talking about you now to lots of other people

I think I'd quite like that?

I would advise anyone interested in local history to seek out your local Family History society, or local history society. they will welcome you with open arms. Other larger places have "friends of" organisations looking after cathedrals, or large graveyards or heritage centres.

I think this is lovely and not weird at all.

As an aside, a woman was murdered by her partner about 25 miles from his 'dump site'. This area is woodland on a drive i take frequently and I often want to stop and put flowers there. Other people have but it seems weird as I never knew this poor woman. Should I? Is it odd?

@purpledalmation not strange. Its a quiet, personal thing you're contemplating. You're not plastering it over your social media or doing it for any other reason than to say ' I remember you'

There are a number of people who do this. They'll tidy untended graves and often leave some flowers.

I wouldn't put a plant, bit a few flowers, then why not.

I’d actually find that creepy - and in the day of social media, I dread to think of someone 100 years from now stumbling across my bikini clad drunken bebo pics from Ibiza 2006, then going to out flowers on my grave 😂

Sort of thing I’d do…. Don’t care of someone thinks it’s odd I think it’s lovely, the sentiment it carries that we are still remember after our passing.

@GneissGuysFinishLast ha ha - can you even imagine?

I don't feel particularly creepy tbh. The finding out about her goes hand in hand with social history really. And all the records are there

@starfishmummy ooh I don't think I'd want to do that! I don't want to randomly tidy graves or anything but I think it's lovely that people do

Why not? It's nice to be remembered and acknowledged that you lived and were once here.

We recently visited a small town in Austria. This small town was home to a well-known sportsperson who tragically died young. I'd read about her life and death. One morning, I went out early to the bakery and passed the church. I knew she was buried in the churchyard, so I went in to pay my respects. I didn't take flowers, but just stood for a minute.

100% this. My dad died 17 years ago and I've never visited his grave, have no intention to. Likewise, I don't want my family feeling as though they have to visit my grave when I'm gone. We're not a family of public gestures.

I loved my dad so much and still think of him every day. He's not in the grave. He's in my memories and brings a smile to me whenever I'm reminded of him. He certainly wouldn't have wanted us standing by his grave to remember him.

Each to their own, if you like leaving flowers that's fine, but a lack of flowers on a grave means nothing.

Oh wow, that is great advice. Love this sort of thing.

Oooh, I read a twitter thread about someone who did something similar! He would visit a loved one's grave, I think his wife, and leave flowers for her every week. He noticed that the grave next to it never had any flowers or visitors. He started bringing an extra bunch of flowers and leaving it on the grave as he felt bad. One day curiosity got the better of him and he googled the name of the deceased and it turns out he was actually a murderer that had killed a young women then committed suicide! The poor man was then faced with a dilemma as he wanted to instead place flowers on the victims grave, but she was buried hundreds of miles away in a different town. I can't remember how it ended but it was written in a very funny way given the tragic content.

The records may be there, but I’m sure she never realised how discoverable they would be.

I kind of get researching your own family, or even people who intentionally put themselves in the public domain, or even finding out about something linked to you - for example, researching the history of families who have lived in your house / but visiting a grave of someone you have never met seems to take things a step further.

My parents bought a house from someone they loosely knew personally - it was sold by an elderly lady (in her 90s) who had dementia. No other families. The family had moved into that home when it was built and it stayed in the family until the old lady died. They found lots of interesting things like military medals - including a really rare one, full army uniform, old travel trunks (from when travel was not common - with stamps from various far flung destinations) as well as old appliances and so on. A lot of it ended up in museums. Sounds like you’d have loved it 😂

but visiting a grave of someone you have never met seems to take things a step further

I'm assuming from that you never visit churches or cathedrals (which are full of graves of people no-one has ever met) or walk through famous cemeteries like Brompton in London or Pere Lachaise in Paris - which is full of very interesting graves that people visit all the time. Jim Morrison and Oscar Wilde, to name but two.

I think it’s a nice thing to do.

I have attended church (in childhood) but the only time I’ve been in any sort of graveyard has been during an actual funeral. Visiting headstones has no interest to me. It has no connection to the living person - I’d much rather go and visit the house they lived in, for example.

The records may be there, but I’m sure she never realised how discoverable they would be
You make it sounds as though it's a violation of some kind. It's not.

It’s just something I’d not be interested in/do, and I’d find it uncomfortable if somehow I found out someone researched me in this way. People are free to do as they wish, and others are entitled to have opinions on it. Op asked for opinions, and that’s mine. I find it odd. Has she not asked, I wouldn’t care.

Fair enough.

Rather than cut flowers, why not stealth sew some wildflower seeds around? Hollyhock seeds maybe, or poppies/welsh poppies? Or you could sneak some bulbs in?

I put flowers (from my garden, so no plastic or cost) on the grave of triplets who died in 1908, buried near my home. I cleared the weeds off it and tidied it up too, as it seems there's no one around to do it anymore. It's not weird.