Could the discovery of some ancient remains at the entrance to St John’s Church in Peterborough delay completion of the city centre refurbishment? Andrew Edwards Strategic Property Manager with Peterborough City Council talks to the BBC’s Paul Stainton at 07:35 in the Peterborough Breakfast Show on BBC Radio Cambridgeshire.
PAUL: Right now though, let’s have a dig around Cathedral Square for some old bones, because apparently work could be delayed on the St John’s Square project in the centre of Peterborough, after archeologists discovered a medieval burial ground outside St John’s Church. Work on the area around the findings has been put on hold, and the finishing date for the project could be pushed back. What I want to know, Andrew Edwards from Peterborough City Council, morning by the way, …
ANDREW: Good morning.
PAUL: … there’s no burial ground logged anywhere around St John’s Church. There wasn’t a cemetery there. So was it murder?
ANDREW: We don’t believe so. We believe they’re medieval graves that went in probably five to six hundred years ago. I must stress here I’m not an archeologist. But the graves went in we believe five to six hundred years ago. We actually discovered them on Tuesday. As you quite rightly say Paul there was no evidence of a medieval grave burial ground, and it was a bit of a shock to us. But what we’ve done at the present moment is we’ve exposed some of the graves. Some of them we can see because of the discolouration of the ground when you take your first scrape off. The graves themselves are actually buried in consecrated ground, so to a large extent we’re working with the Church now to determine what they actually want to do with the graves as they are.
PAUL: Right. But is it going to push back the work on the St John’s Square?
ANDREW: It’s too early to say at the present moment. What we’re looking at doing is an alternative design solution to hopefully leave the graves in place. The problem we could have though is that as we start moving back towards the west end of St John’s Church if there are more graves in there, which obviously there could very well be now, that we may have to look at a design solution that could lead to a further delay. Having said that, at the present moment it’s too early to say, because the actual area the contractor was working on wasn’t on what we describe as the critical path. so he’s been able to work around it as it were.
PAUL: Right. How many bodies have we discovered so far then?
ANDREW: We’ve discovered four. Sorry let me just clarify that. We’ve seen, we’ve identified four graves. How many bodies are actually in each individual grave we’re not sure, and we don’t know until we start excavating, but the point is that the Church would rather the graves were left in situ, because as I say it is in consecrated ground. So what we have at the present moment are four identified .. I’ll use the word grave plots.
PAUL: Right. Ok. So it’s a bit difficult to work out how many bodies and what have you.
ANDREW: Exactly. So there may be multiple burials in a grave.
PAUL: And we’ll have to wait to see whether it has any impact on the finish date of St Johns Square. But you must be pleased with the way Cathedral Square has opened and been perceived by people?
ANDREW: Well yes we are. I think we had just the right weather last week. It opened during half-term, so it gave the impression that we really wanted it to give. Of course we’re working now to get St John’s Square complete, because what I really want to see now is all of this project complete and bringing the benefits that we believe it will.
PAUL: Even I’ve changed my mind Andrew. I like the fountains I watched them the other day for ten minutes. They were doing a bit of dancing and prancing. I quite liked all that.
ANDREW: That’s good news Paul.
PAUL: Andrew, have you got a little Cross of St George in your buttonhole, have you?
ANDREW: My background, I’m not actually English, I’m Welsh you see.
PAUL: We won’t hold that against you.
ANDREW: So what I will be doing is cheering for England. (nb World Cup)
PAUL: Andrew Edwards, he’s on board. He’s not quite joined the campaign to get the flag flying over the Town Hall steps, but he’s on board.
Ancient Bones Found at St John Peterborough
Could the discovery of some ancient remains at the entrance to St John’s Church in Peterborough delay completition of the city centre refurbishment? Andrew Edwards Strategic Property Manager with Peterborough City Council talks to the BBC’s Paul Stainton at 07:35 in the Peterborough Breakfast Show on BBC Radio Cambridegshire.