Frome: Christ Church

The burial register for St John’s Frome 1813- includes burials at Woodlands and Christ Church. For a time, entries for burials that occurred at Christ Church were annotated to indicate this. However, this stopped at the end of 1845, resumed in 1850-52 and 1854-58. Thereafter it not clear whether the burial was at St John’s or Christ Church. The existence of some entries having memorials at St John’s and press reports stating that burials were at Christ Church suggest that there is a mixture.

The entry for the church at ‘A Church Near You’ website has: “The main churchyard is a considerable size, having once been shared with St John's Church (1818-1888). It is now closed for burials and is maintained by Mendip District Council.” (From 1 Apr 2023 Mendip District Council merged with other district councils to form Somerset Council.)

Somerset Heritage Centre’s catalogue has no entries for burial registers for this church. The parish has the following registers:

The usage of the registers for burials at Christ Church is not helpful:

• An entry in the Christ Church register means the burial was at Christ Church
• An entry in the St John’s register can be for a burial in one of: 1) St John’s, 2) Christ Church 3)St Katherine’s, Woodlands and 4) more recently East Hill. Some burials at Christ Church are indicated as such in the register but this is by no means consistent as evidenced by press reports of funeral services being performed at St John’s with the subsequent burial at Christ Church. Burial register entries from the St John's registers have numbers preceded by 'J'.
• For nonconformists there may be no entry in either of the Anglican registers. For example press reports on a burial in 1937 stated that the individual was a member of the (Baptist) Sheppards Barton Church choir, that the funeral occurred there but, while there exists a memorial at Christ Church, there is no entry in either the Christ Church or St John’s registers. Similarly a burial in 1934 has the funeral service in the Catholic church without entries in the Anglican burial registers.
• There is the case of a double entry. Emily Hyatt’s burial in 1954 has entry 219 in the St John’s register and entry 333 in the Christ Church register.

This leaves a residue of non-Anglicans who were buried at Christ Church for whom there is no memorial and no entry in the Anglican burial registers.

It is noteworthy that Frome Dissenters' Cemetery has some officiating ministers  who were Anglican clergy.