LOCAL HISTORY
A visit to your local cemetery will open up a whole new chapter of history
Side by side with our past If you want to learn about the history of an area, a look around the often fading headstones of an old cemetery will yield all sorts of results.
I
n Newport Pagnell, if you allow yourself a stroll around Ousebank cemetery, it is easy to be captured by the many gravestones, some fading with the passing of time, others being ‘devoured’ by the flora that slowly creeps its way over the final resting places of our long lost ancestors and fellow townspeople. That quick stroll can easily turn into a decidedly longer, contemplative visit. 28
One fairly unostentatious, well preserved gravestone commemorates Robert Bason, who passed away on November 30, 1889 aged 78 years. The inscription reads, ‘Who was for 38 years faithful Postman of this town.’ Robert would have been at the heart of the community he served almost four decades, when the town was much smaller and would have been decidedly close-knit. With such a long period of service, he must have been privy to more than a few secrets, too! By the time of the 1881 Census, Robert was recorded as having no occupation, being instead listed as a ‘Superannuated Letter Carrier,’ an old-fashioned term, effectively meaning that advancing age had seen him pensioned off.
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