BEREAVED brothers suffered a “devastating shock” after a council error meant they could not bury their mother with her sweetheart.

Derek Webb, 49, and his siblings Gary and Daniel, learned two days before June Webb’s funeral that her partner’s double grave had not been dug deep enough for her to be buried with him.

Mr Webb said: “We haven’t honoured our mum’s wish – we feel we have let her down.

“She was always there for us when we needed her and we feel we haven’t repaid that when it mattered.”

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Ms Webb, who lived in Saxton Road in Abingdon where her children grew up, died in October from acute myeloid leukaemia.

The 73-year-old had been diagnosed just a few weeks earlier.

Mr Webb, who lives in Uffington, near Faringdon, and his brothers invested in a double plot in Abingdon's Spring Gardens cemetery when her partner of more than two decades, Bert Harris, died 15 years ago.

He said: “She always wanted to go in with her partner – she was devastated by his passing. They were two peas in a pod.”

The brothers buried her at the cemetery on November 15, but six graves away from Mr Harris.

Mr Webb said: “It was difficult for us. It was very strange being gathered around the wrong grave.”

Abingdon Town Council, which is responsible for digging graves in the cemetery, offered to unearth the original grave to make room for a second coffin, but Mr Webb did not want to disturb his stepfather.

He said: “We have had no apology from them. I am a little bit enraged by it. It was a bolt of lightning striking through when they told us.

“It was total, devastating shock. It’s mortifying. It’s upset our grandchildren and children – everybody was flabbergasted.”

Although the town council gave him the new plot free of charge, Mr Webb will have to pay hundreds of pounds for a new gravestone.

Ms Webb, who worked in the RAF, was a grandmother of eight and great-grandmother of one.

Mr Webb said: “It’s going to be a very difficult new year. We can’t draw a line under it.”

Paul Carter, of Edward Carter Funeral Directors in South Avenue, dealt with the family’s funeral.

He said: “I know the Webb family was devastated to find out that the cemetery team had incorrectly dug the wrong depth of grave.

“As part of their step- father’s arrangements we had requested a double-depth grave. However, on this rare occasion it transpired they had mistakenly only dug to a single depth.”

Steve Rich, who is responsible for cemetery management, said he had received no complaint from the family.

He said: “He (Mr Webb) was given a verbal apology. It was a mistake made some years ago, before any of the staff were here.

“The depth of the grave was not recorded in the records. We couldn’t bury any other coffin because there is a legal depth that we have to do.

“It was our mistake, which is why we offered him the free grave – he has been treated very well.

“This is the only case like this that I know of.”

In the UK, double graves must be dug deep enough to house two coffins with six inches of soil between them, with at least three feet of soil above the top coffin.