Finding the location of burial plots using Everafter.
Discover Everafter is a website that covers all the Council cemeteries in Derby City.
Click here to open our Derby Everafter user guide in a separate PDF file.
Using the EverAfter website.
EverAfter, by PlotBox, is a management system for bereavement services, cemeteries and crematoriums. In Derby we are fortunate to have a public searchable database, that covers all 6 of the Derby City Council run Cemeteries. Currently the database is not 100% complete and this is something we as a Friends Group are working towards achieving.
This section is a simple guide to show you how to use Derby Everafter.
Follow this link: https://derbycity.discovereverafter.com
Everafter covers many cemeteries worldwide but using this link will limit the results to the Derby Cemeteries.
This is what you will see.
You then type the name of the person you are looking for into the boxes
The next step is to select which cemetery you want. If you don’t know the cemetery then you just click on the green ‘Search’ button. If you know the cemetery you are wanting, then select the down arrow.
This will give you a menu, select the cemetery you want, and press enter.
This is what you will find as a result.
Here the name ‘John Smith’ is selected., Nottingham Road Cemetery has also been selected.
There will be a list of all the John Smiths.
As you can see from there are 212 John Smiths at Nottingham Road Cemetery.
It will help your search if you have an approximate age of the deceased or the year they died.
When you have found the person you want, you can then go on to find out where that person is in the cemetery via the VIEW button.
This is what you will see.
Look at the picture in detail, there is a lot of information here.
John smith is in Plot number A31, 11885.
He is buried with someone called John Ford.
Your next step will be to use the map. You will see this in the bottom right hand corner of the map.
You can click on the square icon and this will make your map bigger, giving you a full screen view of the cemetery.
Then using the + or – you can zoom in or out.
You can also move the map with your mouse if you have a mouse or your fingers if you are on your phone or have a touch screen.
(Note: Some Apple phones may not let you have a full screen view)
This is the full map when you zoom all the way out..
This should help you to navigate around the cemetery, so you can find the grave you are looking for.
Notes/Questions
I have found the right person and there is no headstone.
Sadly, many plots that do not have a headstone. Not having a headstone doesn’t mean you can’t find the plot, it can be tricky, but not impossible.
I can see the where the plot is, but cannot access it
There are areas of the cemetery that are not accessible as they have developed into woodland over the 170 years the cemetery has been open. Also, the B7 and B8 areas, were all fifth-class graves, when the cemetery was first opened, the fifth-class grave payment was made obsolete, and they were renamed as fourth class. In the B7 and B8 areas there are only a handful of headstones. It could have been that someone wanted to be buried down near the canal or in the woodland.
There is a nature walk, around B7 and B8 that takes you round the back of the cemetery, down towards what is now the A52 road.
Advanced Searching
There is an advanced search function that can be used on the website, where you can enter more details if you have them. This will narrow your search down when you have a person with a common name. For example, there are over 1,000 Smith’s, Allen’s and Bailey’s at Nottingham Road alone.
There is an unrelated person buried in the same plot.
Not everyone could afford to pay for their own private grave.
They may only just have enough to pay for a burial and service, or the person may have died in the workhouse or been discovered deceased and never identified. In those cases, the deceased would be placed into a fourth-class grave (what used to be called pauper’s grave). If a grave isn’t purchased then it can be reused, until the maximum number of persons that can fit into a plot is reached (sometimes up to five adults). Unpurchased graves can be re-opened after a set period of years, usually around 50-70, but quite often much later.
Sometimes, you can find that a plot has been purchased, but there is still an unrelated person in there with them. This often happened where maybe a member of household staff or a dear friend has no money, and the grave owner has given permission for the grave to be re-opened.
Further Assistance.
Please do try and use Everafter to find your ancestors. It is however not yet a full record of all the burials at the cemetery. We are working on the completeness and accuracy of the data held in the system. It will be a long project so please bear with us. If you would like further assistance, feel free to contact us through the website or via Facebook Messenger or by email. We will be able to access the original record books on your behalf.