THE remains of hundreds of Londoners have been removed from a long forgotten cemetery and buried on Canvey.

The forgotten burial ground was uncovered by builders digging foundations for an extension to a school in the London borough of Southwark.

Bosses at T Cribbs & Son, which runs Willows Cemetery, won the contract to remove and bury the bones at the graveyard in Northwick Road.

John Harris, a partner at T Cribbs & Son, said: “We have buried the bones and will put up a memorial in memory of the people buried there.

“There will obviously be no names, because we don’t know their names.

“The land used is right on the edge of the cemetery, to the lefthand side, and would not have been suitable for burials.

“We are going to make that area into a bank, which will act as a windbreak for the rest of the cemetery.”

He added many ancient cemeteries, such as the one in Southwark, were built over and forgotten about because of changes to burial laws in the 1800s. There was a chronic lack of burial space on Canvey until the Willows opened three years ago.

However, Dave Blackwell, leader of Canvey Town Council, did not like the idea of the island’s new burial ground being used in such a way. He said: “I think it’s a sad end for all those people to be dug up from their resting places and thrown in a hole in Canvey.

“I wouldn’t like the thought of my relatives being used as a windbreak.

“It’s a shame Canvey has once again been chosen for something which a lot of people would not consider very nice.”

Former Canvey 2000 chairman Dennis Williams, 63, of Canvey Road, said: “I have mixed feelings about this.

“I remember all those years when we had nowhere to bury people on the island and had to look to places like Pitsea and Benfleet.

“There is the old saying that you look after your own first, but I suppose these people’s remains have to go somewhere.”