LMOTD 2023

Well it’s been a while, hasn’t it? I have been meaning to return to this blog since around June, but my life took a very strange number of twists and turns that have meant nearly finding myself in November with a huge array of things I would like to update you all on and write about.

However, first things first. Let’s take a look at what spooky season had to offer this year.

As has been my yearly tradition for around six years, my October revolved around the London Month of the Dead and the range of talks and tours it had to offer. It is nearly impossible, I am sure, to attend all of the events that are held for LMOTD, and I certainly am not able to just from a financial perspective. I thoroughly recommend attending LMOTD, but let me share some advice with you all. The events are announced around August each year, and the best thing to do to ensure you get the events you want (they sell out fast!) is to plan quickly which ones and then book them there and then. This year I printed out an October 2023 calendar and planned it out with my friend LD. Once we knew which ones we had (and which week I was going to be on call for work and unable to attend) then we booked them between us. It’s a strategy that works and by that point usually only a few of the smaller and more popular tours have already sold out, one fine day I’ll explore the charnel house in Spitalfields!

I won’t cover all of the events that I attended but I will mention some highlights. Firstly, if you can get yourself on a tour by Pete Smith then absolutely do so because he is a wonderful story teller and guide. This year we walked with him from Tower Hill up to Shadwell and explored a part of London that I am geographically close to but knew very little about. I have been on a tour previously with Pete, who is based out of All Hallows by the Tower church, and he simply has the best voice for creating a chilling and encapsulating atmosphere even in the busiest tourist spots of London. I have heard him speak of the execution spot in the gardens by Tower Hill twice now and I will never grow tired of hearing about it from him.

One thing I love about LMOTD is the variety of speakers and topics. Some topics are regular and appear if not every year then every other year, which is great if you missed out on tickets previously. Authors, historians, archaeologists and many other experts appear to share their work or interests and I have learnt so much about some very interesting things. Another aspect I love is the range of venues for the talks including the chapels of some of the Magnificent Seven cemeteries and a range of other suitable spooky places across London.

Two talks stand out for me this year, the first being Ashes to Admin by Evie King who shared aspects of her work as a Council Funeral Officer. Evie speaks so passionately and emotionally about her work, I loved that she used one image for her whole talk which was a photo she took from the window of the home of one of the deceased she helped. It was also great to meet Evie in person for the first time after speaking online for some time (check out her book here)! The second talk I loved was my final one which was by Wayne Perkins and archaeologist who discussed concealed clothing and cats within the walls of buildings. There is something fascinating about how and why people in the past put things in their walls and discovering them today must feel quite eerie. I was amazed at the preservation of some of the items of clothing, and Wayne suggested that the mummified (or smoked!) cats could be a way of ensuring that spiritual ‘pests’ were kept away from the house.

One thing I haven’t mentioned so far, and I cannot ignore, is that fact that this year I was asked to speak at LMOTD for the first time and jumped at the opportunity to take part. The year before last, the first in person talks since the beginning of the pandemic, LD and I helped with one talk serving the drinks and checking tickets when one of the event organisers came down with COVID. Through this, I chatted with one of the other organisers and discussed what kind of talk I could give. This year I presented under the title Sanctum of the Dead but with the less spooky subtitle of A Day in the Life of the Hospital Mortuary. I thoroughly enjoyed sharing my work, and was chuffed to bits that it sold out and people actually attended (as silly as that sounds). This year I have done more public speaking than previously, and it’s something that I would love to do more of in the future. I won’t mention much about the contents of my talk, hopefully I will appear at another LMOTD in the future and you will just have to attend, won’t you?

I will leave this here, and I would like to give a huge thank you to everyone involved in LMOTD from the organisers to the attendees. You all make the month so special and it is a total highlight of my year.

MG x