Cemeteries

Northwood Cemetery headstones insection

Our uniformed Environment Officers and Bereavement Services staff will be out inspecting headstones in Northwood Cemetery during the week commencing 14 November 2024.  

Periodically we must check the stability of burial ground memorials to ensure that they are safe and aren’t likely to fall and hurt someone. 

The often-heavy memorials will undergo a ‘hand test’, where light pressure is applied to the memorial to check if it moves. This test involves no tools or equipment and is intended to provide support to visual checks that suggest it may be unstable, such as damaged or eroding bonding, movement from the original position, leaning or structural damage or disturbance.

Where memorials are found to be loose or pose a risk to members of the public using the cemetery, the memorial may be sensitively placed down alongside the grave and the grave owner contacted.

The utmost care and respect will be paid during this inspection. We do not intend to cause distress to families and friends of the deceased buried in the cemetery.

If you have any feedback contact Bereavement.Services@iow.gov.uk

For more information about managing unstable gravestones

The Record Office keeps registers of the civil cemeteries on the Island. These are burial grounds maintained by us rather than the Church. There are comprehensive Personal Names Indexes for all these registers.

  • Arreton, 1857 to 1987
  • Arreton (Gore), 1909 to 1996
  • Ashey, 1911 to 1999
  • Binstead, 1857 to 2000
  • Carisbrooke (Mount Joy), 1858 to 2000
  • Cowes (East), 1877 to 1933 (entries from 1933 onwards appear in Northwood registers)
  • Newport (Fairlee Road), 1858 to 2000
  • Northwood, 1856 to 1998
  • Ryde, 1863 to 2000
  • Sandown, 1926 to 2000
  • Shanklin, 1877 to 2000
  • Ventnor, 1870 to 2000
  • Wroxall, 1910 to 1934 (entries from 1934 onwards appear in Ventnor registers)

You can also find more information on these websites: