Sunday 18^th November 2018

We had another good session at Skipton’s Holy Trinity Churchyard on Wednesday. It threatened to rain but the sunshine came through for us, and it wasn’t too cold. The autumn leaves took a bit of sweeping away for the purposes of photographing the stones, but they look very colourful and lovely. 

We continued the work of transcribing the legible inscriptions, and photographing the ledgers. 

Surveying the churchyard against a beautiful autumn sky

When I got home I found that the photographs I took before my morning coffee break were rather unfocused while after I had had my brew they were rather clearer! Still trying to catch up on being so tired after all the preparations and the delivery of the Armistice centenary event at Embsay, that the early morning photos I took at Holy Trinity were very blurred. The coffee helped me keep awake and a bit steadier with the camera! So I shall have to re-take the first set again next week. 

In the meantime, I shall be going through all the photos I have taken so far at Holy Trinity and organise them into digital folders. Then I think I shall start to attempt a simple classification of them all according to form and design. 

Kirkby Malham churchyard

On Thursday evening I was giving a talk to the Malhamdale Local History Group. 

The meeting room was packed, and the audience seemed to be interested in the concept of gravestones as something more than simply sources of genealogical data. I hope I have inspired some of them to look at gravestones in a different light. My thanks to the Malham LHG for their welcome and interest. 

Jane Lunnon.