St. Helen's Church - Maintenance Part II

A cross in St. Helen's churchyard

In the autumn and winter months, the maintenance at St. Helen’s church is usually concerned with the essential cleaning of the roofs and rainwater goods, as well as the various steps and paths that form part of the public right of way that crosses the churchyard.

A large gravestone in St. Helen's churchyard

In spring and summer, it is the churchyard that needs the most attention and, as a closed churchyard, it is the responsibility of Rotherham MBC to maintain it – including the repair of paths, boundary and retaining walls and memorials – and to keep the trees monitored and the herbage under control.

Another large gravestone in St. Helen's churchyard

With local authority budgets for this kind of work now being cut to the bone, except for the occasional cutting of grass, their presence is rarely seen and the task of maintaining St. Helen’s churchyard falls on the remaining members of an increasingly elderly congregation.

A large gravestone before and after cleaning

Unsurprisingly, with no more than a handful of hours being spent on all of the tasks needed for the day to day maintenance of the church in any week, very many parts of the churchyard have become overgrown with brambles, sycamore saplings, bindweed and particularly ivy.

A plain cross in St. Helen's churchyard

The latter was left unrestrained to pervade most of the tombs, to take over large sections of the boundary walls and to grow over and completely obscure very many of the monuments and gravestones that are still left standing, as well as many of the trees.

A gravestone in St. Helen's churchyard

As I soon discovered, when I set out - armed with a pair of secateurs and a paint scraper - to clean one of the memorials that are near to the church porch, the roots and tendrils of ivy plants are incredibly invasive and often extremely difficult, if not impossible, to remove from the crevices into which they have grown.

A wall and grave before and after cleaning

Nonetheless, with a bit of patience and care, the effort was soon rewarded by the unveiling of examples of fine letter cutting and stone carving that have been hidden for years. I found this very satisfying and, within a few weeks, I had cleaned most of the heavily overgrown graves throughout the churchyard.

A 20th century gravestone