The American Way of Death Revisited - Jessica Mitford [119]
We went to look at Mr. Ashton’s stock of caskets and coffins, which are kept in two small rooms. The caskets are styled somewhat after the American ones, only far less elaborate; all are made of wood. The use of metal for this purpose is almost unheard of. In fact, the only difference between an English “casket” and a “coffin” is in the shape, the former being rectangular, and the latter, tapered or “kite-shaped.” The lids of all were shut. Feeling that I ought to make some remark, I murmured, “Lovely, lovely,” which would have done nicely in America, where the funeral men take enormous pride in their stock. “I think they’re perfectly awful-looking things,” commented Mr. Ashton cheerfully. He opened one: “Look at that frightful lacy stuff, and all that ghastly satin.” He told me that there is practically no demand for the caskets; not more than a dozen a year are sold. We proceeded to another small room, containing five or six coffins. The cheapest are made of imported African hardwood or English elm, chosen by the majority of Mr. Ashton’s clients. Next in price is the English oak, and most expensive, mahogany. Vaults, in the American sense of a metal or concrete container for the individual coffin, do not exist (“Quite unnecessary,” said Mr. Ashton), although sometimes a family vault of brick may be built to accommodate six or eight coffins. I asked whether without a vault, earth might tend to cave in as the coffin disintegrates. This apparently is not a problem, although it is customary to wait six months for the ground to settle before putting up a gravestone, which is generally erected upon a concrete slab laid over the grave.
The majority of Mr. Ashton’s funerals average about 50 pounds ($140), to which must be added about half as much again for the additional expense of cemetery or crematorium fee, memorial stone, and the like. The most expensive funeral offered in the ordinary course of his business is 100 pounds ($280), and the most expensive one he remembers doing came to 300 pounds. Cremation costs about 4 pounds, and graves are from 15 pounds up—“London-wise, that is,” said Mr. Ashton. Away from London the cost is lower. The great majority of cemeteries and many of the crematoria are municipally owned.
I noticed that the minimum-priced coffin was not displayed with the others, and here I thought I detected the introduction of a particularly obnoxious American practice; was the cheapest coffin being deliberately concealed from the public gaze? I asked where the coffin for the 33-pound funeral was kept, and Mr. Ashton said there were plenty of them in the factory. Hidden there from the customers? I asked. Of course not! The customers never come up here; very very rarely does a person ask to see the coffins in the course of arranging a funeral. “You mean this isn’t a selection room in the American sense—you don’t bring them up here to choose?” “Good Lord, no!” said Mr. Ashton rather reprovingly, as though the very suggestion was in violation of decency and good taste. “People don’t want to look at these dreadful things. I mean, why should they? All that is settled when we talk to the family in the office.”
We next proceeded to the “rest rooms” where the deceased is laid out until the day of the funeral. They looked like cozy little sitting rooms, comfortably furnished with chairs and curtains. While they did not begin to approach the elegance of slumber rooms I had seen in the States, they were, I was told, exceptionally well appointed for England.