I Get Terrified At the Forbidden Hill Top Cemetery Leeds.

hill top cemetery Leeds
The Hill Top Jewish Cemetery opened in 1873

as the name implies, the Hill Top Cemeteries are situated on top of a hill, but above a labyrinth of mining tunnels and shafts.

At the time it couldn’t have been the most pleasant of places to be buried as it was surrounded by Coal Pits, although up until 1850 it would have still been in Farnley Wood.

Those Coal Pits have come back to haunt the cemetery. Around 3000 people are buried there but the cemetery is unsafe as some of the graves are collapsing into the old coal workings.

We have no documents relating to the purchase of these grounds ,
Maps showed the land was riddled with china clay and limestone mine shafts.
In the 19th century owners could just walk away from a disused mine once it was depleted of minerals. Today one still has the responsibility for the safety of the disused mine even when the ownership has been transferred for other purposes.

In 2006, six graves and headstones in the cemetery collapsed thirty feet into what was believed to be a mineshaft and forced Leeds Jewish Orthodox Cemeteries to close the grounds for repairs.
These were carried out by the Residual Coal Board Authority who had accepted responsibility for the site and grounds. The cemeteries reopened in June 2007 with assurances about their safety. However, a year later, following further subsidence, all sections of the cemeteries on Hill Top were deemed unsafe and are now closed permanently.