Hundreds lined the streets in Hartlepool for the full ceremonial funeral of Matthew Blades, the Cleveland Police officer killed in a wrong-way crash on the A66 on 22 August. Uniformed officers carried PC Blades' coffin into St Joseph's Roman Catholic Church as Amazing Grace played.
The funeral drew officers from Cleveland and other forces, along with members of the public and emergency services. Cleveland Police chief constable Victoria Fuller greeted mourners at the church entrance, while the black hearse was led by a single Cleveland Police motorcycle and surrounded by officers and bagpipe players.
Hartlepool tribute
Officers lowered their flags at the side of the street as the procession passed, and a floral display spelling out “dad” sat on top of the hearse. The scale of the turnout matched the loss felt across policing after the crash that killed Blades, 37, and PC Tom Clough, 38, when a Volkswagen Passat collided with their marked armed response car near Middlesbrough.
Five young men were also killed in the crash. That detail sat behind the public ceremony: the funeral was a tribute to one officer, but it came after a collision with seven deaths in total.
Cleveland Police Federation
Lauren Somerville, speaking for Blades' family, said life feels unbearably quiet without the father-of-two's “silly jokes” and laughter. She added that flowers had been delivered to the force's stations and said people from Australia, France and America had been in touch.
Sarah Jones and Anna Turley attended the funeral, alongside community leaders and politicians. Andy Burnham paid tribute earlier in the Commons, saying, “I also want to send our sympathies to the hundreds of people who will gather today at the funeral of PC Matthew Blades, including many serving police officers, and we send our thanks to them all for their service and their work to keep our community safe.”
A66 crash
The procession showed how far the loss reached beyond Cleveland Police. What caused the Volkswagen Passat to be on the wrong side of the A66 is still the unanswered point at the center of the crash that brought officers, mourners and emergency services together in Hartlepool.
