A BEREAVED son believes he had a wreath he laid on his mother’s grave at Rath Cemetery deliberately moved by someone onto another burial plot and later went missing altogether.
In December, Jon O’Sullivan, who now lives and works in Northampton, England, returned home to place a wreath on his mother, Ena Spring O’Sullivan’s, grave on what would have been her birthday. Ena, from Kevin Barry Villas, passed away last April.
A few weeks later, after Jon had turned to England, the wreath – with personalised card attached – was spotted by a family member on another grave and it was promptly returned to Ena’s resting place.
However, the wreath was missing once more, but on this occasion it was gone for good.
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“I put wreath on her grave when I was over in December for her birthday,” said Jon O’Sullivan. “A few days after I went back to England, the wreath was gone.”
“It was found on someone else’s grave on the opposite side of the graveyard, but still with my card on it and it was then put back. The wreath was gone again last week and it couldn’t be found it all,” he said.
Jon feels because there was personalised card from him to his mother on the card, this was not a mistake. “To me it doesn’t make sense because it is marked and identified that the wreath doesn’t belong to anyone else,” he said.
A possible explanation could be the adverse weather conditions over the past month, blowing wreaths around, but Jon said he has heard of other incidents of wreaths being taken from graves in Rath in the past.
“Other people have said to me that they have had wreaths taken from the grave of loved ones and that it’s a common thing. I think it’s fairly low to steal from somebody’s grave.”
However, Rath cemetery committee member and local Tralee Municipal District councillor, Sam Locke, said incidents of people taking wreaths from graves are not common.
“I wouldn’t imagine that’s happening on a regular basis in the cemetery. I’ve been on the committee, for the past 25 years and we’ve had very few incidents of people deliberately going over and trying to upset other people’s graves by trying to enhance their own,” Cllr Locke told TraleeToday.ie.
“If there has been interference to a grave of a loved one and they know something is happening, they need to report it to the gardaí or the caretaker in Rath. He might be able to observe it and take it further if evidence is needed in a case of law,” he said.
It’s amazing that this was the only wreath that the “breeze” disturbed on my sisters grave. It’s also amazing that the grave the wreath was initially found on had the exact same wording that her son had written on the card. This is not the first time wreaths have been removed from graves in Rath.