The UK’s longest serving gravedigger has no plans to hang up his shovel – after working in cemeteries for more than 40 years.
Mick Woods, 61, says he enjoys being out in nature and using his hands to give people a “respectful” send off.
Mick has spades of experience after digging more than 20,000 graves in cemeteries around Nottinghamshire since he started in 1984.
The grandad still digs more than four graves a week at Mansfield Cemetery and says the deepest can take nearly two days to complete.
Mick, who lives near the cemetery, said: “At the end of the day you can go home satisfied that you’ve helped someone with their bereavements and know that their loved ones have been laid to rest with respect.
“It’s a long process and in their grief they need to know their loved ones are respected from the minute they go from the undertaker to the last place where they’ll be laid to rest.”
Mick started digging graves after working as a gardener aged 16 before getting a job at Mansfield Cemetery in 1984.
He admits that the essential job can be risky and he has escaped being buried himself on several occasions due to graves collapsing following heavy rain.
On another occasion the ground gave way around the edge of a grave and Mick almost tumbled into the hole but was saved when he scrambled out.
He said: “Everyday is different and I like being outdoors, you have to take the rough with the smooth with the weather and you get to meet some interesting families and you get to know all about their loved ones.
“At Mansfield we’re up to about 40,000 graves, and when I started there were only about 20,000, so I’ve done about 20,000 graves or even more.
“We go in peaks and troughs but it averages out about three or four a week over the four cemeteries that we work over.”
While the average grave used to take half a day to prepare, Mick can now have one ready in under 45 minutes thanks to modern machinery.
He added: “In the early days when we used to do everything by hand and it could take all day or more to dig a six foot grave.
“These days we do get the tractor to do most of the digging and then we have to go down and make sure the measurements are right and that we haven’t disturbed the coffin if it’s what we call a ‘reopen’.”
Mick and his team usually carry out exhumations when people move away and want to relocate the remains of their loved ones to a cemetery nearby.
Mick says his job requires him and his team to have a good sense of humour and have people make jokes at his expense.
He added: “When people asked me what I do, I just blurt it out – grave digger/gardener – that’s what am and what I have done for last 40 years.
“You do get the odd joke like – ‘you must work in the dead centre of Mansfield’ or ‘your job must be dead boring’ but I just let them wash over me. I am quite happy doing what I am doing and that’s the main thing.”
Despite his gavedigging career, Mick admits he still hasn’t decided if he wants to be buried or cremated when his own time’s up.
He added: “I don’t really know which I want, buried or cremated, to be fair.
“It’s a funny one, I’m getting to that age where I should be making my mind up where I want to be.
“I always joke with the girls at the crematorium that I’m going to go up the A614 and be chucked over the hedge and let the pigs eat me. So I really don’t know.
“I’ve dug family graves where we’ve had wives, husbands and uncles. Thankfully I’ve never had to dig one for my own family.
“Usually we do try and dig a couple of days in advance so we’re ready for the day the funeral takes place.
“I don’t know many people who have done it for as long as me, they all seem to come and go.
“Obviously the old boys who trained me have all gone now. It looks like I’m going to be here until retirement and then put my shovel up at the end.
“I’m the longest running digger, I’m the dad of the team.”
