SDO16327 - Stapehill Abbey, Wimborne, Dorset. Archaeological Investigations in Former Refectory.

‘Terrain Archaeology undertook the identification and removal of all human remains beneath the floor of the former Refectory, originally the old Chapel of Holy Cross Abbey, Stapehill. Two graves were discovered and excavated. In the centre of the room was the grave of Sir Thomas Moore, 6th Baronet of Fawley, Berkshire, who died in 1807, aged 81 years. His body appears to have been reburied in this location in the 1850s. The other grave contained the body of a young adult female, most likely one of the religious community. Her identity has not been determined. Both graves cut through a robber trench that may represent the line of the original west wall of the old chapel, before its rebuilding and conversion into the refectory sometime between 1851 and 1861.’