The Interments (felo de se) Act 1882 (45 & 46 Vict. c. 19) is an act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom which allowed a person whose death was felo de se (criminal suicide) to be buried in a churchyard at any hour, and with the usual religious rites.Peck, H T and Peabody, S H and Richardson C F. The International Cyclopedia: A Compedium of Human Knowledge. Dodd, Mead and Company. 1892. Volume 14. Page 59. Previously, suicides could be buried only between 9pm and midnight, and without rites. Sir James Stephen said that the act was "so worded as to lead any ordinary reader to suppose that till it passed suicides were buried at a crossroads with a stake through their bodies". Burial by the wayside had, in fact, been banned by the Burial of Suicide Act 1823 (4 Geo. 3. c. 52).
The Suicide Act 1961 abolished felo de se and in consequence also repealed the 1882 act.
Section 3 Section 3 of the act allowed interment to be made in any way prescribed or authorised by the Burial Laws Amendment Act 1880 (43 & 44 Vict. c. 41). By section 13 of that act, any clergyman of the Church of England authorised to perform the burial service was permitted, in any case where the office for the burial of the dead according to the rites of the Church of England might not be used, to use at the burial ground such service, consisting of prayers taken from the Book of Common Prayer and portions of the Holy Scripture, as might be prescribed or approved by the ordinary.Burial of a Person Found "Felo de se" (1906) 50 Sol Jo 147 to 148The Law Times. 1893. Volume 96. Page 408.
Subsequent developments The whole act was repealed by section 3(2) of, and the second schedule to, the Suicide Act 1961 (9 & 10 Eliz. 2. c. 60), which came into force on 3 August 1961.
See also Suicide legislation
Notes
References Halsbury's Statutes
External links