The study adopted an organisational case study design to examine UK childhood and to explore the reasons why bereaved children and their families had used a service and the benefits derived from the experience. Interviews with 14 families were conducted, including 24 children whose ages ranged from 4 to 16, bereaved through anticipated and sudden deaths. A phenomenological approach was used for the analysis of bereaved children's' perspectives. Despite initial anxiety, bereaved children found the service helpful. Being with other bereaved children was an important aspect for those who attended group activities, helping them feel less isolated. Those who had attended individual sessions valued talking about the things they were worried about, and to say what they wanted to someone who would not get upset. Using the service helped all children understand more, allaying anxieties about what had happened to them, or to the dead person. It also helped them talk about their feelings within the family, from which they got relief. The bereaved parents felt the service had helped their child, who had improved as a result. It had provided the child with a safe place in which to speak to someone who was not going to be upset, and who made the experience fun. Parents described the effect as ‘laying ghosts’. The service had also been useful in identifying other underlying problems, and in making appropriate referrals. Although not all children or parents wanted to use a service, the research indicates that those that did benefited from access to childhood bereavement service provision.