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Re Hughes, deceased

Manchester Consistory Court: Tattersall Ch, August 2010 Exhumation – family disagreement – exceptional circumstances

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 December 2010

Ruth Arlow
Affiliation:
Barrister, Deputy Chancellor of the Dioceses of Chichester and Norwich
Will Adam
Affiliation:
Vicar of St Paul, Winchmore Hill
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Abstract

Type
Case Notes
Copyright
Copyright © Ecclesiastical Law Society 2011

After the death of the deceased a disagreement arose between her five children, two of whom interred her cremated remains in the parents’ grave, concealing the same from the deceased's widower and the other children. When those children eventually discovered the whereabouts of the deceased's remains, a faculty was sought – for their exhumation and their reinterment in the deceased's widower's local churchyard in anticipation of his remains ultimately being interred with those of the deceased. In refusing the faculty, the chancellor held that the fact that the majority of the family wished for the remains to be interred elsewhere would not alone justify an exhumation. He accepted that, prior to her death, the deceased had indicated an intention that her remains be buried with her parents. He was not satisfied that she had had any intention of being interred with her husband. No exceptional circumstances were found and the application was rejected. [RA]