Coach Lane, Quaker Burial Ground 1

In 1698 the Society of Friends opened their first meeting house in North Shields. It stood at the Bull Ring, and near to it, in Coach Lane, opposite Trinity Church, they bought a piece of copyhold land from Robert Lawson of Chirton for a burial ground. Phillips notes a burial as early as 1711, but the NCH merely states the graveyard was in existence before 1729. In 1800 a new meeting house was acquired with, in 1811, a new burial ground close by. Both these graveyards were closed by order in Council under the Burial Acts of 1853-54. Phillips, in 1894, noted the site was still intact, "separated from the public road by a high stone wall", and used for grazing. Its most recent use was as a small garden. The burial ground was excavated in 2010 by PCA. No headstone were found intact. In total, 243 individual graves and 19 separate charnel features were recorded. Biographical information from the burials were very limited. A number of shroud pins were recovered along with coffin ittings such as hinges and brackets.