Why memorial inscriptions are worth the trip

A burial register tells you that someone was buried. A gravestone can tell you who they were. Memorial inscriptions — MIs, in the shorthand of family historians — frequently supply a date of birth when no baptism survives, gather a whole family onto one stone, name a trade, a street or a former home, and occasionally record an origin hundreds of miles away. A monument also quietly records social standing: the mason chosen, the size of the plot, the verse at the foot.

For research before civil registration in 1837, or when you are trying to separate two men of the same name in one parish, that combination of detail is often decisive. The stone may also be the only physical trace of an ancestor that survives anywhere.

Check what has already been transcribed

Before you pull on your boots, find out whether someone has done the work already. Many churchyards were surveyed in the 1970s and 1980s by local family history societies, and their transcripts often preserve inscriptions that have since weathered away or been laid flat.

• Local family history societies, which frequently publish MI surveys by parish.
• County record offices and local studies libraries, which hold churchyard plans and plot maps.
• Municipal cemeteries, where the burial register, grave register and plot number are usually held by the burial authority.
• Parish chest material, including sextons' notebooks and later grave plans.
• Newspaper death notices and funeral reports, which sometimes describe the monument erected.

A transcript made forty years ago is not a substitute for visiting, but it is an excellent checklist — and it will tell you which stones are worth seeking out first.

How to read and record a gravestone

Work patiently and from the whole to the part. Photograph the stone in its setting, then move closer for the inscription, then closer still for each line. Note the plot number if there is one, the direction the inscription faces, and the names on neighbouring stones, because families were usually buried together.

• Transcribe the wording exactly as it stands. Do not modernise spellings or silently expand abbreviations.
• Use square brackets for anything you have supplied, and a question mark for anything uncertain.
• Record ages as given — "aged 43 years" — and note separately the birth year you calculate from them.
• Watch for relationship phrases: beloved wife of, relict of, consort of, second daughter of, late of.
• Look for the mason's name, often at the bottom right. It helps with dating and can lead you to other family graves.
• Check the back and the sides, and look for kerb stones and footstones, which may carry extra names.

Write your notes up the same day, while you still remember which photograph belongs to which grave.

Deciphering worn and weather-beaten stones

Slate and good-quality marble hold lettering well; sandstone and limestone often do not. A torch or a low sun held at a grazing angle will throw shadows into shallow cuts and bring up lettering that seems invisible in flat daylight. Early morning and late afternoon are your best hours. A light spray of plain water can help on some stones, but never use chalk, flour, shaving foam, oil or wire brushes — they leave residue and cause lasting damage.

Be alert to old dating conventions. Before 1752 the year began on 25 March, so a January burial may be recorded a year earlier than you expect, and Quaker registers use numbered months rather than names. Where a stone defeats you, compare it with the burial register; the register may also give an age or abode the stone omits.

Cemetery etiquette and the rules that matter

Cemeteries and churchyards are working places of remembrance, not outdoor museums. A courteous approach keeps access open for everyone.

• Check opening hours and ask at the office before photographing or spending a long session; some sites require notification.
• If a funeral or a mourner is present, withdraw and come back another time.
• Never lean on, sit on or attempt to move a headstone. Many are unstable and can topple.
• Keep to paths where possible, close gates behind you, and take care around livestock in rural churchyards.
• Avoid brass rubbings and wax crayon rubbings on soft stone; they abrade the surface. Photography is safer.
• Remove nothing — not flowers, not bulbs, not fragments of stone.
• Take a companion to remote sites, tell someone your route, and watch for sunken graves and hidden kerbs.

Cross-referencing and sharing what you find

An inscription is a starting point, not a conclusion. Compare the stone against the burial register, parish registers, census returns, probate records and newspaper notices, and note any disagreement in age or spelling rather than smoothing it over. Record the source and the date of your visit for every transcription.

Finally, pass your work on. Send a copy to the local family history society and to the relevant record office. Stones fall, are vandalised or are moved during churchyard clearance, and your careful notes may one day be the only surviving record of a name that mattered a great deal to someone.