The Royal Hospital Haslar
Each year we run a student research excavation on the site of the burial grounds of the Royal Hospital Haslar in Gosport, on the Hampshire coast of southern England. The work is part of a wider Land Quality Assessment in partnership with Defence Estates, an arm of the Ministry of Defence, who are forming plans for the future of the Hospital site when it ceases to be operational in 2009 or 2010. The nature and extent of the Haslar burial grounds is significant as they will fundamentally affect any future plans for the property.
Between the opening of the Royal Hospital Haslar in 1753 and 1826 (when a major review of burial practice took place), the whole of the area to the south-west of the hospital building, including ‘the Paddock’ and areas now covered by buildings and gardens was utilised indiscriminately as an unconsecrated burial ground for those who died in the hospital. There are in excess of 30,000 people buried in this area, making it probably the largest burial ground of people how have served in the British military in Europe if not the world.
For more information see our Antiquity article
If you would like to join the excavation at HASLAR contact Dr Andrew Shortland.
Return to Archaeological Research Projects
Dr Andrew J Shortland
T: +44 (0)1793 785642
E: a.shortland@cranfield.ac.uk
Centre for Archaeological and Forensic Analysis
Centre for Forensic Anthropology Research
