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THE WILTSHIRE ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND NATURAL HISTORY MAGAZINE 



these were re-used by relatives who might consider, 

 correctly, that they were legally responsible for the 

 stone. That they could use it again is an interesting 

 legal point, though the permission of the incumbent 

 was seen as necessary. The re-use, alternatively, may 

 have involved the selection of gravestones which 

 recorded families who had by then died out, and 

 which were felt to belong to no one and so could 

 be taken up, cleaned off, and re-inscribed. 

 Plenderleath could not make clear the relationships 

 between those originally and subsequently 

 commemorated, but considered it ethically 

 undesirable in any circumstances. 



Fig. 2. Headstone 30 to Uriah Potton, died 1826, and 

 32, to Mary Elizabeth Wright, died 1845 



The field evidence 



A careful examination of the headstones in Cherhill 

 churchyard was carried out in April 2000 to discover 

 if the five identified headstones still survived, and 

 also to ascertain the stylistic changes in the 

 churchyard that made it possible for Plenderleath 

 to have his suspicions raised in the first place. The 

 survey was also designed to allow detailed 

 examination of the inscribed headstone surfaces to 

 identify any traces of previous inscriptions, and of 

 the cross-sections of the headstones to suggest a 

 definite thinning of the memorials due to such texts 

 being removed. 



The plan produced by Plenderleath (Figure 1) 

 proved to be accurate and effective for the purpose 

 of locating stones, and all but no. 65 were still in 

 situ. The one missing stone may be one of a number 

 removed from position and now stacked, leaning 

 against the east wall of the chancel, with their 

 inscribed faces towards the wall. This is most 

 unfortunate as it is this memorial which is the only 



re-used stone dated 1824, and so must be the one 

 which he describes as having decoration. 

 Plenderleath's comment 'looks like a palimpsest', 

 written after the inscription in his transcript (1883, 

 341), suggests that it was not like the others available 

 for study today, and must have had some of the 

 earlier features still visible. The 1824 date for stone 

 65 also provides the earliest dated example of the 

 reuse of a headstone at Cherhill. 



The four surviving stones, 30, 32, 41, and 44, 

 all lie in the row of headstones placed facing the 

 east side of the path leading up to the south porch 

 of the church, and so all are in prominent positions. 

 Two (nos. 30 and 32) are the nearest headstones to 

 the porch, and are thick stones with typically shaped 

 tops, but no decoration (Figure 2). The inscriptions, 

 not easily legible today, start very high on the stone, 

 so if there had been any decoration it would have 

 been erased before the new text was added. Each 

 stone, according to the parish clerk quoted by 

 Plenderleath, was reused under a different 

 incumbent. The text of headstone 30 implies a date 

 of erection following the death of Uriah Potton in 



Fig. 3. Headstone 44 to Jonas Rivers, died 1849, with an 

 unusually shaped top 



