Non–Muslim Cemetery
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The Non–Muslim Cemetery ("NMC" or Christian Cemetery) is a
cemetery A cemetery, burial ground, gravesite or graveyard is a place where the remains of dead people are buried or otherwise interred. The word ''cemetery'' (from Greek , "sleeping place") implies that the land is specifically designated as a bu ...
in
Jeddah Jeddah ( ), also spelled Jedda, Jiddah or Jidda ( ; ar, , Jidda, ), is a city in the Hejaz region of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) and the country's commercial center. Established in the 6th century BC as a fishing village, Jeddah's pro ...
in the
Hejaz The Hejaz (, also ; ar, ٱلْحِجَاز, al-Ḥijāz, lit=the Barrier, ) is a region in the west of Saudi Arabia. It includes the cities of Mecca, Medina, Jeddah, Tabuk, Yanbu, Taif, and Baljurashi. It is also known as the "Western Prov ...
region of
Saudi Arabia Saudi Arabia, officially the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA), is a country in Western Asia. It covers the bulk of the Arabian Peninsula, and has a land area of about , making it the fifth-largest country in Asia, the second-largest in the Ara ...
. It is located on the King Fahd Branch Road, in Jeddah's
Al-Balad Al-Balad ( ar, البلد, "The City"), is the 90th Surah or chapter of the Qur'an. It is composed of 20 '' ayat'' (verses). Summary *1-7 Man, though created in misery, yet boasts of his riches *8-16 Captives to be freed and the poor and orp ...
district. The cemetery contains more than 400 graves. A grey sarcophagus dedicated to the French explorer Charles Huber is located in the cemetery but it is not known if it contains Huber's remains. The French explorer Charles-Xavier Rochet d'Héricourt was buried at the cemetery in 1854. The British Consul in Jeddah, James Zohrab, identified 13 British graves, five Austrians, four French Vice-Consuls and two Jewish graves at the cemetery in 1878. A single
Commonwealth War Graves Commission The Commonwealth War Graves Commission (CWGC) is an intergovernmental organisation of six independent member states whose principal function is to mark, record and maintain the graves and places of commemoration of Commonwealth of Nations m ...
(CWGC) gravestone is in the cemetery, that of Private John Arthur Hogan of the
British Army The British Army is the principal land warfare force of the United Kingdom, a part of the British Armed Forces along with the Royal Navy and the Royal Air Force. , the British Army comprises 79,380 regular full-time personnel, 4,090 Gurkha ...
's
Royal Army Service Corps The Royal Army Service Corps (RASC) was a corps of the British Army responsible for land, coastal and lake transport, air despatch, barracks administration, the Army Fire Service, staffing headquarters' units, supply of food, water, fuel and do ...
. Hogan died on 3 June 1944 in the
Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposi ...
. Jean-Baptiste Lapadu-Hargues, a French soldier of the First World War is also buried in the cemetery. Cyril Ousman, the British Vice-consul of Jeddah who was shot and killed by Prince Mishari bin Abdulaziz Al Saud in 1951 is also buried here. Recent burials have been rare and infrequent, and are mostly of Indian and Filipino children. Burials require the approval of the Mayor of Jeddah. The cemetery had reached maximum capacity by 2006. The cemetery is hidden from sight by high trees. There is no sign to indicate its existence. In a 2011 article for ''The Saudi Gazette'', Matouq Al-Shareef reported that locals were reticent regarding the exact location of the cemetery and the cemetery guard would only provide information with the approval of the relevant local consulate. The supervision of the site is the responsibility of Western consulates in Jeddah. The cemetery was already in existence in 1541 to bury Portuguese casualties resulting from the Ottoman–Portuguese wars. The Danish explorer
Carsten Niebuhr Carsten Niebuhr, or Karsten Niebuhr (17 March 1733 Lüdingworth – 26 April 1815 Meldorf, Dithmarschen), was a German mathematician, cartographer, and explorer in the service of Denmark. He is renowned for his participation in the Royal Danish ...
made the first reference to a 'Christian Cemetery' in Jeddah on his 1762 map of the city drawn during the Danish Arabia expedition of the 1760s. Niebuhr's cemetery was located close to or at the exact location of the present cemetery, just outside Jeddah's city walls. The walls of the cemetery may have been built by
Muhammad Ali of Egypt Muhammad Ali Pasha al-Mas'ud ibn Agha, also known as Muhammad Ali of Egypt and the Sudan ( sq, Mehmet Ali Pasha, ar, محمد علي باشا, ; ota, محمد علی پاشا المسعود بن آغا; ; 4 March 1769 – 2 August 1849), was ...
in the aftermath of the Ottoman-Saudi wars of the 1810s. The walls protected against vandalism, local dogs, and the occasional flooding by the nearby Red Sea. The cemetery was vandalised following the Battle of Jeddah in 1925. In 2018, the centenary of the end of the First World War was commemorated at the cemetery by representatives of foreign consulates in Jeddah who laid wreaths on the tombs of Hogan and Lapadu-Hargues. An attack on the cemetery using an
Improvised explosive device An improvised explosive device (IED) is a bomb constructed and deployed in ways other than in conventional military action. It may be constructed of conventional military explosives, such as an artillery shell, attached to a detonating mecha ...
injured several people during the annual Armistice Day commemorations on 11 November 2020. Commonwealth graves are managed by the
Commonwealth War Graves Commission The Commonwealth War Graves Commission (CWGC) is an intergovernmental organisation of six independent member states whose principal function is to mark, record and maintain the graves and places of commemoration of Commonwealth of Nations m ...
.


1990s renovations

The cemetery had fallen into disrepair since the 1920s, but was still used for the burials of non-Muslims. A committee was formed in the early 1990s by local consulates, and a company chosen by the German consulate was engaged to refurbish the cemetery in 1995. The renovations cost 350,000 riyals and were funded by the local consulate and donations from companies and individuals. The cemetery was made level and the wall was repainted and repaired. Cenotaphs were cleaned and old concrete gravemarkers were replaced by marble tombstones. Gravemarkers of historic significance were moved against the western wall of the cemetery to maximise space. Vegetation including trees and vines were planted. In 2000, the Dutch Consulate, on behalf of the consulate committee, applied to the Saudi
Ministry of Foreign Affairs In many countries, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs is the government department responsible for the state's diplomacy, bilateral, and multilateral relations affairs as well as for providing support for a country's citizens who are abroad. The enti ...
for a new burial plot.


See also

*
Protestant Cemetery, Rome The Cimitero Acattolico (Non-Catholic Cemetery) of Rome, often referred to as the Cimitero dei protestanti (Protestant Cemetery) or Cimitero degli Inglesi (English Cemetery), is a private cemetery in the rione of Testaccio in Rome. It is near ...


References


External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Non-Muslim Cemetery Cemeteries in Saudi Arabia Commonwealth War Graves Commission cemeteries in Saudi Arabia Tourist attractions in Jeddah World War II cemeteries Ottoman Arabia Buildings and structures in Jeddah Attacks in Asia in 2020 Improvised explosive device bombings in 2020 Improvised explosive device bombings in Saudi Arabia