I found a tomb. There's about 8 bodies resting in it and as I started to read it, it moved me. It tells a story of a 19th century family: the Bibbys from Levenshulme. It begins with Eliza, Thomas & Mary's 20 month-old toddler who died in 1803. Then there's the 1 day-old Edward who died 2 1/2 years later. And there's Daniel Burton (10) who died 15 years later aged 20 days and two other brothers: Thomas (10) and James (18) who died within 3 days of each other in 1927.I started to think about how much grief this family had had to put up with. So many children they undoubtably loved and yet lost over such a long period. How did they carry on? Could we have done the same?
And it gets worse - Mary, their mother died in 1826; so Thomas had to endure the loss of two more sons only a year after the mother. And he himself only lasted another 9 years. I'm stunned. How did people hang on with such trauma?But then I noticed something else. Another name. At the end, Mary, another daughter (their only remaining one?): died in 1891 aged an incredible 87 years.
I think what it says is that these people had real faith in a way rarely seen today. They ploughed on when most of us would have given up. And it bore lasting fruit in the long-term - maybe Mary's descendents are around today. I was moved.
