Michael Aherne, Sr, Manchester, England

Chorlton Water Park in Manchester, England, United Kingdom

Birth: 1815, England

Death: Oct. 18, 1891
Chorlton-Cum-Hardy
Metropolitan Borough of Manchester
Greater Manchester, England

Married: about 1833 in England to Mary Aherne (maiden name unknown)

One of three mortuary chapels at Southern Cemetery
Added by: Mike Berrell, 12/31/2006

Southern Cemetery
Also known as: Manchester Southern Cemetery

Barlow Moor Road
Chorlton-Cum-Hardy
Metropolitan Borough of Manchester
Greater Manchester  England
Postal Code: M21 7GL

Chorlton-cum-Hardy, Greater Manchester, England, three miles south of Manchester city centre. It was opened in 1879. It is the largest cemetery in the United Kingdom and second largest in Europe.

The main area of the cemetery is located to the north of Barlow Moor Road and to the west of the A5103 Princess Road; a northwards extension is situated to the north of Nell Lane. Manchester City Council owns and administers the cemetery.

There is a Jewish Cemetery in the northwest section, next to Barlow Moor Road and a Muslim section adjacent to it. The rest of the area of the cemetery is divided into plots for particular religious denominations, e.g., Anglicans, Roman Catholics, others.

A war memorial stands here to commemorate Allied servicemen who died in the World Wars: many of them died in the two military hospitals in south Manchester (i.e. those at Grangethorpe Road, Fallowfield, and Nell Lane, West Didsbury).

Immediately adjacent to the northwest corner of the cemetery, also on Barlow Moor Road, is the Manchester Crematorium which opened in 1892, the second in the United Kingdom. Near the entrance to its grounds the Commonwealth War Graves Commission (CWGC) erected a memorial stone to 14 Commonwealth servicemen of the First World War who were cremated here, while 177 servicemen and women who were cremated during the Second World War are listed on the screen wall at the cemetery’s Second World War war graves plot.

During the First World War, Manchester contained between thirty and forty war hospitals, including the 2nd Western General Hospital and the Nell Lane Military Hospital for prisoners of war. Many of those buried in the cemeteries and churchyards of the city died in these hospitals.

During the Second World War, there was a Royal Air Force Station at Heaton Park, Manchester. Manchester Southern Cemetery contains burials of both wars, the majority of them scattered. There are also separate plots for First and Second World War burials, but in neither case are the graves marked individually; instead, each plot has a Screen Wall bearing the names of those buried there. Each plot has a Cross of Sacrifice. In all, 803 Commonwealth casualties of the First World War, including 1 unidentified, and 475 from the Second World War, including 3 unidentified, are now commemorated in the cemetery; there is also 1 non-war service grave.

The Screen Wall in the Second World War plot also bears the names of 177 servicemen and women whose remains were cremated. Further memorials in this plot commemorate 17 Polish servicemen buried there, and a number of casualties of both wars buried in other cemeteries and churchyards in the Manchester area whose graves could no longer be maintained.

Casualties buried in the following cemeteries and churchyards are now alternatively commemorated on Screen Wall Memorials in Manchester Southern Cemetery:

Ashton-under-Lyne (St Michael) Churchyard Extension
Birch-in-Rusholme (St James) Churchyard
Bury (Brunswick) United Methodist Cemetery
Cheetham Hill (St Luke) Churchyard
Eccles (St Mary) Churchyard
Eccleston (St Thomas) Churchyard Extension
Edgeworth Congregational Chapelyard
Manchester General Cemetery
Newton Heath (All Saints) Church Cemetery
Openshaw (St Barnabas) Churchyard
Swinton Unitarian Chapelyard
(text added by Geoffrey Gillon)

One of three mortuary chapels at Southern Cemetery
Added by: Mike Berrell, 12/31/2006

Burial:
Southern Cemetery
Chorlton-Cum-Hardy
Metropolitan Borough of Manchester
Greater Manchester, England
Plot: HRoman Catholic 767

Ohel (Jewish mortuary chapel), Added by: Mike Berrell, 4/19/2008

Created by: Cyndi

Record added: Feb 19, 2016
Find A Grave Memorial# 158353811