Funerals were always a big occasion. The whole island would pay their respects to the deceased and you would never speak badly of the dead. One of the first funerals that I went to was when I was around 10 years old. I recorded it in my diary and my neighbor Mrs. Benjamin had died. I remember that we all all called her Mumma Nanna. Her grandson Clarence, better known as Claddy, was still living with his grandmother and he was so grief stricken that he had collapsed at the burial.
I thought that he was never going to stop crying. He was crying so much it made everyone else cry.
Families would be absolutely distraught when their loved ones died to the point where they would need holding up. People would wear black clothes for a whole year or more and grieve even longer. The funeral procession would be very long and sometimes from Jamestown all the way to Half Tree Hollow. People would always stop and respect the funeral.
St. Helena didn’t have a crematorium so the bodies were always buried in the graveyard at St. Pauls Church or the The Dungeon. The smell and the sound of the earth landing on the coffin is something that sort of stays with you for life. We didn’t have wakes on St. Helena as the thought of a party after losing a loved one as thought to be disrespectful to the grieving process.
As children we all love the traditions. I do hope that some of the traditions get passed on to the younger generations still. When I was a child we didn’t have television on the island and the older generation always loved passing down stories to us. I just loved to listen to these old stories and yarns as they were called on St. Helena, traditions must be passed down.
Weddings were a big event and tradition on St. Helena. Most, if not all of the children were Christian and God parents were chosen carefully and played a big part in a child’s life. I knew my God parents quite well and got on well with them. There was Mrs. Freeda Young, Mrs. Mary Thomas and Billy Joe Thomas, they were indeed wonderful people to have in my life.
Wedding cake was homemade and beautifully decorated. Weddings were always big occasions with lots of homemade food and beautiful dresses. Tables were decorated in the entrance halls decorated with flowers where everybody would have fun and dance the night away. I went to lots of weddings but the best wedding that I went to was my Cousin Sexton Yon and his wife Barbara. Barbara was a beautiful bride. There was lots to eat and drink and my grandmother and I had such a good time dancing. When we left they gave us a big bag of food. It was always so dark out at Deadwood so that it was pitch black.
My mother never drank alcohol but because of the darkness she fell over a donkey in the field. We staggered home laughing our head off. We were so happy that we didn’t care if Poppa was in a bad mood or not.
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