Gray’s elegy

Andrew HN Gray’s letter (11 October) on graveyard maintenance in Edinburgh was both apt and timely and he hardly deserved to be rounded on by Alan McKinney (Letters, 12 October), who went, I feel, out of his way to praise the City of Edinburgh Council for the maintenance of its graveyards, particularly at Liberton Cemetery.

I admit to having a vested interest in the matter as my grandfather, Edward Groves, died in 1941 when residing at Beauchamp Road and was buried in Liberton Cemetery.

With a view to perhaps being buried in the same lair, I wrote a few years ago to Edinburgh Corporation and was informed that the council would have no objections. You can imagine my horror when last year my son, on visiting Liberton Cemetery, discovered that the headstone on the grave had been flattened on orders from the council.

I cannot help but deplore the insensitivity and discourtesy of those responsible on the council – who had my address on file – in failing to inform me of what they had done and why, given that the headstone on my grandfather’s grave was a bare 50cm in height and was just over 70 years old.

My hope now is that by way of atonement the council will see fit to re-erect the flattened headstone under the community payback scheme.

William W Groves

Staikhill

Lanark