The front of St Giles Hill Graveyard showing the damaged wall section to the left of the gate.

You may have noticed that we have carried out some emergency repair work on a part of the front wall of the graveyard because the extreme wet had hastened its possible collapse.

The damaged section of the wall this September when a new pavement was being installed (reason for red barriers)

Saddleback capping bricks sitting on a course of normal bricks

The winter months are usually avoided because the lime mortar dries slowly. The work was done in two stages to allow the mortar to dry. First, flints were mortared in place and left for a couple of days. Then a course of bricks was set on top. This is not the finish. A course of saddleback capping bricks is needed to finish off. We don’t currently have enough capping bricks to finish the job.

Repair work is scheduled to resume next year when we have acquired specialist capping bricks that match the originals.

We need 40 to 45 capping bricks to replace those lost. They are unavailable as reclaimed bricks. We have found a good modern match, that will need to be cut down to size at extra cost. The total cost will be £340. We are currently collecting the money to buy them. If anyone can spare the odd £5 in these difficult times, it would help a lot. FSGHG bank details can be found on the website. SUPPORT US

As you can see in the photo, the lime mortar used is rather yellow. An identical lime mortar has been used elsewhere in the graveyard and it does tone down with time.

The wall after a course of bricks had been mortared in place.

The new Saturday workday schedule is shown below:

Occasionally the dates might be changed so please check. More details will be published on Facebook and the website events section prior to the workday.

We are also running mid-week schedule for those who are unable to attend on Saturday.

Instructions as follows:

Meet at the front gate Alresford Rd. from 10:00am.

Please sign in and view the risk assessment.

Tools will be available, but please bring stout footwear and gloves. Your own tools are welcome especially 2-stroke or battery strimmers. No problem if you can only stay and hour.

If the weather is inclement, we will cancel the workday. If in doubt or you need more information call 07772300271

Tasks include:

Cutting back vegetation, tending memorials, collecting sticks and stones and making dead hedges. Clearing ground ready for sowing seed.

Location of St Giles Hill Graveyard entrance.

Chairs report covering the period February 2020 to June 2021.

This is the first AGM to be held by Friends of St Giles Hill Graveyard.

Thanks to everyone for your support during the year. A summary of our activity is given below under headings reflecting our goals for the year.

Structure and governance.

• February 2020 – became constituted, the current constitution was adopted.
• March 2020 – Planned open day postpones owing to Covid.
• April/May 2020 – review of governance policies during the report period. Available documents outlining our policies cover safeguarding, data protection and privacy, safety and equality and diversity.

Accessibility: The introduction of mechanized tools has allowed us to keep the graveyard accessible. Working with hand tools is slow and requires many volunteers.

Increasing Biodiversity: Started preparing selected sunny open areas for sowing chalk grassland seed. This was done with the help of volunteers especially from the Rotary Club and the Rotaract Club. This was a great success. Other activities carried out include a programme of planting native flora plug plants. management of biomass on this site is carried out with the principle of no burning. Most of the material is used to make dead hedges or stumperies to aid wildlife. We have put up some bird nest boxes and plan to put up some bat boxes.

Getting people involved: Getting people involved during the covid-19 pandemic has been difficult. The monthly visits of the Community payback teams were curtailed and owing to the restrictions and our ability to organize volunteer work parties was limited. Despite this we have achieved much. Thank you to everyone.

Working with other groups:  We have been working with Rotary Club volunteers and hope that this will be a long-term relationship.  The Hampshire and IOW Amphibian and Reptile Group are carrying out a monitor survey. We are liaising with the Commonwealth War Graves Commission who periodically visit the war graves for maintenance. Other groups that we work with include the Winchester Rotary Club and Perlins Community Project based in Winnall who will be working with us in the autumn.

Cultural importance to community: We are using Facebook and our website to publish information and articles that explain the historic significance of St Giles Hill Graveyard to our local community.

Finances: The financial situation will be reported in detail by The Treasurer. The Friends have done very well with fund raising over the report period. FSGHG received £2165 during the report period and currently have £1032.19 in the bank account.

Other events:

Closure of the graveyard: The graveyard has recently been closed for burials. Winchester City Council (WCC) have already take over some work activity.

Looking forward.

In the coming period it is planned to work with The Rotary Club Conservation Group who we hope will support the graveyard with hands on volunteer activity in addition to the money donated. This includes the continuation of work to establish chalk grassland flora in open areas of the graveyard and putting up bird and bat boxes.

As restrictions are easing it will be important to increase the volunteer base and improve our workday planning by publishing a workday calendar and developing better communications. We would also like to better relationships with similar groups. Whilst continuing our existing relationships with interest groups we want to develop new projects with other groups in our area, for instance with Schools, Scouts and Guides or The University.

A longer-term project is to form a flint wall repair group. The wall is in a critical state crumbling in many places.

FSGHG will encourage further historical or archaeological research in the graveyard.

Currently our financial situation looks rosy, but there will be a long-term pressure to finance operation. We need to find a solution to this. Charging for membership has been one suggestion.

Notice of Annual General Meeting – 13th July 2021 at 18:30 via Zoom meeting

Friends of St Giles Hill Graveyard AGM

Please sign up to get a link if you want to attend.

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It has been a busy month in St Giles Hill Graveyard. The cool dry weather has meant that we have not had to do a lot of mowing or strimming, but we have still had a lot of activity.

• Charles Radcliff prospective Lib. Dem. candidate for Winchester City Council in the upcoming elections visited the graveyard on the 31^st March to have a tour of the graveyard. Members of the friends committee Anna and Dave Stewart and Dominic Hiscock were also there to greet him. We discussed the importance of the graveyard for local people, heritage, and wildlife.

• With the impending transfer of duty of maintenance of the graveyard from church to Winchester City Council And following discussions at the end of march work visits have been made to the graveyard by Id Verde personnel and arboriculturists to carry out work that FSGHG are not insured for.

Tree men in St Giles Hill Graveyard.

• A work group from The Rotary Club visited on the 10^th April and did some fine work preparing ground to sow chalk meadow grass seeds. We now have to wait for warmer and wetter times to do the sowing.

• Brian Cooper who makes bird boxes for nature trusts (including Winnall Moors) delivered 4 bird boxes to the graveyards on the 19th April. He also helped us put them up. We aim to put more boxes up at a later stage as well as bat boxes.

Brian Cooper putting up Bird boxes with the help of Dave Stewart in St Giles Hill Graveyard.

• Steve Brine MP for Winchester visited St Giles Hill Graveyard on the 23^rd of April together with Alex Piney. From the Friends of St Giles Hill were Anna & Dave Stewart, Dominic Hiscock, and Mie Thorpe. We had a very pleasant stroll and discussion. Please see the link to the Hampshire Chronicle article for more details. https://www.hampshirechronicle.co.uk/news/19265425.steve-brine-mp-tours-st-giles-hill-graveyard-volunteers/

Steve Brine with Dominic Hiscock and Dave Stewart from FSGHG.

• We are currently having discussions with the Rotary Club Conservation Group about a longer-term relationship that would benefit the graveyard. We hope to announce something soon.Closure of the graveyard for burials: The Privy Council had a meeting on the 28^th St Giles Hill

• Graveyard is mentioned under the Burial Act 1853 (notices) – Order giving notice of the discontinuance of burials. Notices announcing this will go up on the graveyard gates. After a month it will go back to Privy Council for the final closure order, probably in July. The map below is part of the privy council meeting document.

As we come out of lockdown and the weather gets warmer and wetter, we will need volunteers so please offer your services by Emailing fsghg@stgileshill.org.uk or one of the committee members.

It is now a year since the beginning of the first lockdown. 2020 started with great optimism. Friends of St Giles Hill Graveyard finally had insurance to cover our work in the graveyard. This is a must have item, to cover our volunteers working in the graveyard. It is also needed to get recognition as a charity and as an enabler when making applications for financial support. Our insurance was purchased with money raised by St Giles Hill Residence Association. Thank you for your support. In April HMRC recognized FSGHG as a charity for tax purposes opening more door for funding. Then on 23^rd March 2020 we had Lockdown owing to Covid-19. Ever since we have had restrictions in numbers of people allowed to meet.

We had a full calendar of monthly work visits from the Probation service who have helped us make good progress over the last few years. We were planning an open day at the graveyard in March. But then came Covid 19. The open day had to be postponed. The Probation Service community payback activities were suspended. We were expecting a severe, short term, impact to our maintenance programme.

Fortunately, we had applied for a grant from Winchester City Town Forum to purchase equipment. We were awarded £500 and using these funds we purchased a good quality petrol driven lawnmower. Initially it was difficult to use such machinery in the graveyard owing to a profusion of old stumps that constituted trip hazards and During the previous 2 years we has been old stumps   and applying socially distancing policy have been able to organize volunteers either singly or in groups of 2 or 3 from the same household for an hour’s exercise working in the graveyard now and again. This has enabled us to keep up with our maintenance programme. When restrictions were less, we have also had volunteering visits from the Rotary Club and students from Mountbatten school in Romsey and several small family groups.

In spring we purchased a power lawnmower with a grant from Winchester City Council Town Forum which greatly increased our productivity. We are aiming to add more power equipment in the future with a second grant recently given to us by the Town Forum.

The value of this open space has proved itself over the Covid-19 summer with much increased numbers of people visiting St Giles Hill Graveyard. During the lockdown we had many visitors some exercising, some walking their dogs, but many come because they are interest in the heritage or wildlife to be seen in the graveyard.

At the end of 2020 It had come to light that the graveyard was still open for burials and needed to be officially closed. The closure would enable the church to request the transfer of maintenance responsibility to Winchester City Council under section 215 of the Local Government Act 1972.  A public notice was therefore placed in the Hampshire Chronicle by the church on behalf of the Secretary of State for Justice on Thursday 28th January giving notice of the closure and once the public notice period has passed, the proposal would be put to the privy council to decide. The closure has now taken place enabling the church to request the transfer.

Winchester City Council were swift in their response. The Friends had alerted the church to a to a tree that has partially blew down in the storm before Christmas and was in a dangerous state. Tree surgeons were swiftly on the spot to deal with the situation.  We have also been contacted by the WCC Open Spaces Department concerning ongoing maintenance and had an initial discussion with two representatives from WCC regarding our management plan.

As lockdown eases and we get back to some normality we will be in contact with a range of volunteer activities for those interested in this Ancient Graveyard.

News March 2020 – a rapidly changing situation.

Three years ago, in March 2017 we cancelled volunteer workdays in St Giles Hill Graveyard owing to legal issues and insurance cover for our group when working in the graveyard. We had hoped to resolve the issues quickly but that did not come about.

In March 2020 Friends of St Giles Hill Graveyard are pleased to announce the transition from an informal group to a formal group with a constituted committee.

A quick intro for those who do not know St Giles Hill Graveyard. The graveyard was originally administered by the medieval churches of St Peter Chesil and St John in the Soke. It commands an impressive north facing slope of St Giles Hill, and before urbanization, would have had magnificent uninterrupted views of the Downs. The graveyard can be accessed by 2 gates on the Alresford Road.  The cemetery is old; the earliest surviving burial is from 1694 and the last recorded burial from 1973.

The Friends are now backed by insurance to protect our volunteers and have received finance from the St Giles Hill Residence association (donated from a raffle) and Winchester City Council Town Forum small grants committee. Over the last couple of years, we have made good progress with the help of the Probation Services Community Payback teams. Now we are hoping to make even more progress with the help of volunteers.

Before the Covid-19 crisis hit us all, the committee were hoping to have an Open Day on the 18th April with guided tours and with some work activities. This has now been posponed ubtil later in the year.

Three years ago, in March we still had the white carpet of Snowdrop and we were still waiting for the islands of yellow Daffodils and Narcissus. This year we had a wonderful season of Snowdrops and we already have the daffodils mentioned better that they have ever been.

Contact details.

email: graveyard@stgileshill.org.uk

Webpage: https://www.stgileshill.org.uk/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/stgileshillgraveyard/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/stgileshillgraveyard/

Best Regards,

FSGHG