CEMETERY records in Blackburn with Darwen have been transferred to a digital archive for the first time – and the public will be given a rare insight this weekend.

The borough’s burial and cremation records, which date back to 1857, are among the first in the North West to be digitised.

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Pleasington Crematorium has also taken the unusual step of throwing open its doors to visitors on Sunday.

Details of the deceased at Blackburn Cemetery, Darwen’s Old and Eastern cemeteries, Pleasington Cemetery and Pleasington Crematorium have been added to the family history website Deceased Online.

The records contain information from more than 330,000 burials and cremations, comprising almost one million individual items.

Coun Jim Smith, Blackburn with Darwen Council’s executive member for environment, said: “We are delighted to be one of the first councils in North West England to have completed the digitisation of all these fascinating records making them available more easily to local, national and international researchers.

“We are committed to developing local, cultural and family history resources whilst preserving and conserving original old documents.”

The records include digital scans of all burial and cremation registers, details of all graves indicating all those buried in each grave, and maps indicating the section in each cemetery where each grave is located.

Pleasington Crematorium, off Tower Road, will be open from 11am to 3pm on Sunday, with staff on hand to answer questions about the development of the site.