A photo that fills me with despair and happiness in similar amounts.

[Old Frightful]

Spotted this on the internet. I haven't seen it before although plenty on here may have done. Two Dutch people who were married for 38 years but couldn't be buried in the same cemetery due to religion. The husband died first and his widow found a way for them to be close by planning this before she passed.

The graves of a Catholic woman and her Protestant husband, who were not allowed to be buried together. On the Protestant part of this cemetery J.W.C van Gorcum, colonel of the Dutch Cavalry and militia commissioner in Limburg is buried. His wife, lady J.C.P.H van Aefferden is buried in the Catholic part. They were married in 1842, he was a protestant and didn’t belong to the nobility.

This caused quite a commotion in Roermond. After being married for 38 years the colonel died in 1880 and was buried on the protestant part of the cemetery against the wall. His wife died in 1888 and had decided not to be buried in the family tomb but on the other side of the wall, the closest she could get to her husband. Two clasped hands connect the graves across the wall.

 

[Padge]

The idiocy of religion and the inventiveness and imagination of the human spirit.