West Boldon, Quaker Burial Ground

In process of time, when frds increased, the Sunderland Meeting's burying ground was usually at West Bowden in ye garden of Christopher Trewhitt, where...a great many of our frds were buried, as also from Shields. The distance from Sunderland proved too inconvenient, and in 1670 the Friends acquired the first of their burial grounds in Sunderland (HER no. 64). The earliest reference found to a burial at Boldon is 1657, the latest 1670. Phillips could not locate this cemetery. The Ordnance Survey base its location on a published letter from Rev. J.T. Brown, who said that in the extreme north-west corner of the garden of the old hall 11 skeletons in soft wood, unmarked coffins were dug up in c. 1899. He had learned that this was traditionally the site of the Quaker burying ground.