#UK family mistakenly buries complete stranger at relative’s funeral

A UK family inadvertently held a funeral for a complete stranger — and then buried him — following a bizarre mix-up, according to a new report.

The family buried an elderly man they thought was their relative at St. Mary’s Church in Rockcliffe village, near Carlisle, back on July 6, The News and Star reported.

The grave error was revealed a day later, when mortuary staff contacted the funeral home asking when the body of the man scheduled to be buried at Rockcliffe would be collected, the outlet reported.

The man they actually buried was a year younger than their loved one, according to the report. He had been scheduled for cremation on July 13 — but that had been postponed, sources told the outlet.

His body needed to be exhumed — but that didn’t happen until July 15, nine days after the funeral, according to the report.

The correct corpse was interred there the day of the exhumation.

An internal investigation is now underway, a spokeswoman for North Cumbria Integrated Care Foundation NHS Trust told the paper.

A funeral director spokesman said nothing of the sort has happened in the more than 150 years the family business has been around.

Both offered their sympathies to the affected families.