On this day, 7th October, 1847 the body of an unknown child, found dead in the vicinity of Donegall Pass, was buried in Clifton Street Cemetery, following an inquest into the death. The ‘Weekly Vindicator’ reported on the proceedings in explicit detail:
It appeared from the evidence, that two little boys had been going across the fields, when they discovered the body lying in the ditch without the slightest bit of covering on it. Dr. Aickin, who examined the body, stated, that it had been in such and advanced state of decomposition, that it was uttlerly impossible for him to say whether the child had come by its death by unfair means or not. However, there were no marks of violence on the body that he could trace. The jury returned a verdict to the effect, that the body of the child was found lying in a ditch, but how it came by its death, they had no evidence to show.
The burial of the young infant was covered by the Belfast Charitable Society. No one appears to have come forward to claim this boy who was buried nameless in an unmarked grave.
