Catalogue description Home Office: Burials and Cremation (BUR, BCR and LGR Symbol Series) Files

The papers in the series are arranged in numerical order by departmental file reference. The inclusion of a date preceeding a file reference number (as in BUR (1960) 17/1/1) indicates that the year in which the file was created was included in the reference. Thus the full departmental reference of a file listed as BUR (1960) 17/1/1 would be BUR 60 17/1/1.

The Home Office is responsible for burials and burial grounds, cremations and crematoria and exhumation under the Burial and Cremation Acts.

The responsibilities of the Home Office with regard to burials and burial grounds are as defined by the Burial Acts 1852-1906. The main functions are the issuing of licences (as required by the Burial Act 1857) for the exhumation or disturbance in any way of human remains (except in cases of removal from one area of consecrated ground to another, where a bishop's faculty, rather than a licence, is required), the approval (as required by the Burial Act 1900) of tables of fees charged by ministers at funeral services and the approval (as required by the Burial Acts 1853 and 1900) of the consecration or allotment to any particular religious denomination of any part of a burial ground maintained by a local authority. The responsibilities of the Department with regard to cremation and crematoria are as defined by the Cremation Acts 1902 and 1952 and the Cremation Regulations 1903 onwards. The main function is the revision of existing cremation regulations and the drawing up of fresh regulations.