Sileby History
Its people and places. A community through time.
MEMORIAL INSCRIPTIONS
Sileby History Pages
Parsons family gravestone
Sileby Parish Church, Nave area (PCNV7)
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Northwest corner (PCNW)
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Wilkins memorials (PCW)
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Porch West memorials (PCPW)
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Porch East memorials (PCPE)
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Chancel (outside) memorials (PCCH)
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Mural Tablets and Wall memorials (PCMT)
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Chancel (inside) memorials (PCCM)
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South Aisle memorials (PCSA)
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​North Aisle (Vestry and Organ area) memorials (PCNA)
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Nave memorials (PCNV)
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Baptist Chapel Yard, Cossington Road
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Chapel Yard memorials
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Baptist Chapel, Mountsorrel Lane
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Wall memorial
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Sileby Parish Churchyard
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Key to Churchyard plan
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Northwest corner (PCNW)
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Wilkins memorials (PCW)
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Porch West memorials (PCPW)
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Porch East memorials (PCPE)
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Chancel (outside) memorials (PCCH)
Until the 17th century the option for burial in Sileby was a simple one. A person could be laid to rest in the consecrated parish churchyard or within the church itself for those who could afford the burial fees. By 1881 no further burials were accepted in the churchyard (with a few exceptions).
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Eventually, a new cemetery was opened for all denominations in 1881. The segregation of the cemetery between rigidly governed Anglican and Nonconformist portions was practiced for many years afterwards.
1. Sileby Parish Churchyard - Northwest corner (PCNW)
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In 1961 many of the gravestones in the main body of the churchyard were moved away from their original sites and re-erected in rows at the north west corner of the yard. This listing relates to the stones in their re-sited location. Results are from surveys I conducted in 2015 and before. Photograph and schematic plan below.
Gravestone
Transcription
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PCNW - Row A
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PCNW - Row B
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PCNW - Row C
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PCNW - Row D
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PCNW - Row E
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PCNW - Row F
PCNW - Row G
PCNW - Row H
PCNW - Row I
PCNW - Row J
PCNW - Row K
PCNW - Row L
PCNW - Row M
PCNW - Row N
PCNW - Row O
2. Sileby Parish Churchyard - Wilkins Memorials (PCW)
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These six memorials are situated near the western boundary wall just south of the western churchyard gate. They all relate to the Wilkins family, a prosperous milling, baking and farming family of 18th and early 19th century Sileby.
3. Sileby Parish Churchyard - Porch West Memorials (PCPW)
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These six gravestones are situated in the ground between the west side of the church porch and the south west corner of the south aisle. Photograph and schematic plan below.
4. Sileby Parish Churchyard - Porch East Memorials (PCPE)
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Fourteen gravestones situated in the ground between the east side of the church porch and the southern wall of the Lady Chapel. Photograph and schematic plan below.
5. Sileby Parish Churchyard - Chancel (outside) memorials (PCCH)
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These 14 gravestones are situated in the ground between the boiler room and the south wall of the chancel. CH13 is the gravestone of Edward Barradell and his wife, an often quoted and quirky epitaph. It mentions his 52 years as parish clerk tolling the bell and singing psalms, etc. Also, it is widely believed that these rows were the location from where PC Wilkinson was shot and killed in 1903. Photographs and schematic plan below.
In 1790 the historian John Throsby remarked that Sileby's parish church had a nave, two aisles (north and south) and a spacious chancel, but no monuments. He goes on to make comments about the memorials there and makes particular reference to the large number of gentry buried within the church.
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Many of the memorials listed here are not 'open' for the general viewer to see. Some are hidden under carpets and other flooring, and some are eroded by the passage of feet to the point of being difficult to read or totally undecipherable.
Over the years a number of surveys have listed these memorials. The historian Nichols outlines them as they were in 1800. An undated card index at Leicestershire Record Office shows that the surveyors had full access to the stones. I conducted a brief assessment in 2005 when I got to see the Nave stones, and again in 2015 when the North Aisle stones were briefly uncovered. The record of each inscription will be a mixture of all three sources, and are noted as such. Locations and transcriptions given below.
Sileby Parish Church Interior
North Aisle (Vestry and Organ area) memorials (PCNA)​
Baptist Chapel Yard, Cossington Road
The Baptist Chapel was registered as a place of worship in 1818 for a group of General Baptists, an offshoot of the Rothley Baptist congregation. A burial ground is shown here on the earliest ordnance survey map of 1884. The existing memorials cover a period of over fifty years ending with the Cooper monument in 1881. The listings here are from a survey that I conducted in 2004, predating the reconstruction of the chapel in early 2007. Photographs and transcriptions below.
(Above) Sileby Baptist Chapel, 2007: Location of Memorials BP1-BP5
(Left) Sileby Baptist Chapel, 2004 :
Front Yard BP6
Old Baptist Chapel, Mountsorrel Lane
A chapel was situated at this location from the 1790s. Although a number of people are believed to be buried here, only one memorial remains. This is dedicated to Daniel Harley and his wife Elizabeth. The stone is badly weathered and illegible in places.
The inscriptions have been organised into clusters around where they are or where they were situated. There are a number of groupings :