MORTUARY - ACCOMMODATION [To the Editor of THE SPECTATOR.]
Sia,—It was with great interest that I read your paragraph regarding the absence of decent mortuary accommodation in rural areas.
I could mention a case where a woman was killed in a Sussex village not far from her home, but the body had to remain where the accident occurred until after the inquest. She was not allowed to be laid out by a village woman, but had to be handled by two policemen who placed her naked on the earthen floor of the shed, and covered her with a sack. The owner of the house was so horrified that he offered a trestle table and a sheet to cover her.
A similar case occurred in another village in the district. There the Vicar of the parish requested that the body be
taken to the Vicarage instead of being put in a shed. Again the police removed all her clothes, having nothing to cover her with until the Vicar's wife gave one of her own night- dresses.
It is a scandal that the law does not permit a local woman to perform the last ministrations to a female body, and in these days of frequent road-side deaths suitable accommoda- tion .should be available other than some dirty and often
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