Forget the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, the Taj Mahal or the Pyramids of Giza. According to many publications that report on Sheffield — as well as, bizarrely, those that cover areas like Wales and Hull — the final resting place of 49-year-old William Collins might just be the most notable grave in the entire world. Since it was first unveiled at Shiregreen Cemetery four years ago, there have been 34 articles about it in the Sheffield Star alone, with plenty of ink also spilled by national publications like the Telegraph, the Daily Mail, the Independent and the Guardian.
Next to such a mountain of coverage, even what is apparently “one of the largest graves in the UK” inevitably ends up seeming rather diminutive. For example, is the second headstone for Willy’s late brother Michael — which kicked off another avalanche of press after it was installed next to his last month — really nine feet tall? That’s what one article alleges and, having foolishly neglected to bring a tape measure with me to the cemetery, I am unable to fact check this claim. What I can confirm with the evidence of my own eyes is that the recent Daily Mail headline yelping that these two brothers’ graves are “taking over” Shiregreen Cemetery is outright hysteria. Vast swathes of land are empty. It takes me about ten minutes and almost a full lap of the place just to find them.
But the Collins’ brothers are clearly occupying a significant plot of land in many people’s minds. According to one article, Willy’s grave had rather ghoulishly become “something of a lunchtime tourist attraction” less than two weeks after it was unveiled. Everyone I speak to knows exactly what I’m talking about the second I so much as mention two graves in Shiregreen. “I’m sure there’s more cases like this around the country,” one local stonemason tells me, “but, up here, it’s the only one I’m aware of.” To be as fair as possible to the local publications who have relentlessly covered this story, articles with headlines like “Grave for Sheffield dad-of-nine which breaks cemetery rules still in place after 18 months” are only churned out because they are confident that people will read them.
So what exactly is the problem here? If you strip everything else away, the basic issue is that the headstones in question are both far too big, according to the council’s own rules. As a council spokesperson helpfully confirms, “a singular memorial on one burial plot” cannot be taller than 1.35 metres, more than 90 cm wide or 45cm thick. Willy’s grave — which is sculpted from marble and has more than enough room for two life-size statues of the man in question, a pair of oversized boxing gloves and a jukebox — is quite obviously in violation. Though less imposing, the same is true of the headstone for his brother Michael.
The headstones for Willy Collins (left) and his brother Michael. Credit: The Tribune.
The Collins are far from the only ones flouting those guidelines in this very cemetery, as Willy’s eldest daughter points out during one of my unsuccessful attempts to interview her. “If they turned their cameras around and showed the full graveyard,” she says of the other journalists who have reported on these graves, “they would see other headstones that are quite big and extravagant.” Just a stone’s throw from the two Collins’ plots, for example, lies a large joint memorial for Willy and Tommy Cawley, which I reckon is actually a smidge taller at its highest point.
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