Victorian Cemeteries

It’s been a challenge to visit all my London places this month. Train/tube strikes, and sweltering temperatures meant that some visits were delayed, which has never happened before in the five years since I started exploring the capital. The extremely hot weather has now hopefully come to an end, the strikes, who knows? Anyway, here are the last of the ‘Magnificent Seven’ cemeteries: Highgate, East and West, and Kensal Green. The fourth one, Camberwell Old Cemetery was built in the ‘second wave’ of outer London relocation of graveyards.

To recap, the Magnificent Seven are burial grounds established in Victorian times when central London graveyards ran out of space as the population increased and land in ‘urban parishes’ was approved for burial (the Burial Act 1832). These burial grounds are now carefully maintained as havens for wildlife and quiet, green spaces to visit in the urban environment.

Highgate Cemetery, East and West

Highgate Cemetery was established in 1839 and there are 170,000 people buried in 53,000 graves across both sites; the cemetery is still open for burials. It’s owned and maintained by Friends of Highgate Cemetery Trust. It’s the most famous of the London Cemeteries and has been popular for both burials and as an interesting day out from Victorian times to the present day. The Victorians’ interest (or perhaps even obsession) with death and burial practices led to the creation of an area of Gothic tombs and catacombs and the Egyptian Avenue in the West Cemetery.

I never thought I’d be a ‘grave tourist’, but these two sites contain a fascinating combination of history, fame, notoriety and quirkiness and I spent over TWO HOURS wandering both sites; here are my favourites. First the East Cemetery:

Douglas Adams, Author
Weeping Angel from Dr Who?
Patrick Caulfield, Pop Artist
Much loved Mum of the Cundey Family
Richard Foyle, co founder of Foyle’s bookshops
Roger Lloyd Pack aka ‘Trigger’
Jim Horn was not a partner in Penguin Books!

Andrea Levy, author
And most famous of all, Karl Marx

West Cemetery

George Michael and members of his family are buried here, but it is forbidden to take photographs of the grave site.

Nero the Lion from Wombwell Circus
Thomas Sayers’ dog, Lion
Sleeping Angel
Triangular Monument
Alexander Litvinenko, murdered Russian intelligence agent
George Hering, Artist, complete with palette and brushes

Kensal Green Cemetery

This was originally known as the General Cemetery of All Souls; it was established in 1833 and is the oldest of the Magnificent Seven and is still in operation. There are 65,000 graves and 250,000 interments, including 500 members of the British nobility. There were originally four separate areas: Roman Catholic, Church of England, Christian Orthodox (Greek), and a Christian Dissenters cemetery. There are several large, imposing monuments dated in the 18 and 1900s, reflecting the status of the person buried therein; but there are also a couple of impressive modern ones (see pictures below.) There are also large burial chambers, individual ‘houses’ for whole families. Like most of the cemeteries, Kensal Green is built on London clay which has shifted and caused some of the monuments to lean precariously.

A **spectacular monument to a 12 year old boy**

**Memorial to a fruit and veg market trader – with Christmas decorations all ready!**

Charles Blondin, acrobat and tightrope walker
Graceful Angel
Precarious monument!
The ‘broken’ column represents a life cut chort

**Another Viscount of India with battle armour monument**

Camberwell Old Cemetery

Two cemeteries were established in 1855 in Honor Oak, South East London, as part of the relocation of cemeteries to the suburbs. Over 30,000 burials took place in the next thirty years, and subsequently a new cemetery was established half a mile away. These cemeteries are still open for burials, and there were some very elaborate, ‘showy’ monuments from recent years, mostly commemorating the lives and premature deaths of children and young people; heart-breaking to read the tributes. Needless to say, I have not included any photos of these recent monuments. The following photos reflect Victorian Gothic romanticism in commemorating the deaths of loved ones; elaborate and showy in their own way at the time. And check out these beautiful gates!

Modern monument

Celtic Cross half hidden by ivy
Old rugged cross on a rock

**Good use of former grave site – growing runner beans!**

It’s been fascinating to explore these Victorian cemeteries and observe how the fashion for commemorative monuments has changed over 180 years. Many of the graves, old and new, demonstrate the family’s dedication to celebrating their loved one’s life in a meaningful way. However, reading the inscriptions was very poignant and made me feel quite sad, even if the person had been dead for 100 years, especially if it was a child or young person. So I’m glad that the Cemeteries Series has now finished!

Another month has gone by in which I was not able to visit places in London, however I thought you might be interested in some spectacular cemeteries in the outer London boroughs, which I’ve visited over the years. They are all very ‘Instagram-able’ if you fancy exploring any of them. These four are some of the ‘Magnificent Seven’ burial grounds established in Victorian times when central London graveyards ran out of space as the population increased and land in ‘urban parishes’ was approved for burial (the Burial Act 1852.) The three I haven’t visited are: Kensal Green Cemetery (the oldest at 1833), Highgate Cemetery (the famous one; Karl Marx is buried there, and most of the movies featuring English cemeteries are filmed there) and Tower Hamlets Cemetery (closed for burials in 1966 and is now a picturesque park). So they are all worth a visit when restrictions on travel are lifted.

These are the four I have visited:

West Norwood Cemetery: opened in 1837, 40 acres, and the first cemetery in the world to use the Gothic style, and one of the first landscaped cemeteries in London. It certainly is beautifully laid out, ‘a mixture of historic monumental cemetery and modern lawn cemetery’ (Wiki). It features a Greek Orthodox section and 69 Grade ll listed buildings and is also recognised by Lambeth Council as a site of nature conservation value. Famous people buried here: Hiram Maxim (inventor of a type of machine gun – nice!), Mrs Beeton (Cookery writer of the 1950s) and Henry Tate of (Tate and Lyle Sugar).

This is a magnificent Greek Temple replica in the Greek Orthodox section

That Gothic look

I love these memorials fallen against each other

Abney Park Cemetery

Opened in 1840, 32 acres, originally an area of parkland laid out by Lady Mary Abney in the 18^th Century and converted to a cemetery under the Burial Act 1852. It became the main burial place of English nonconformists when Bunhill Fields in the City closed. (I’ve mentioned nonconformists before, they were Protestant Christians who separated from the Church of England in the 17^th and 18^th Centuries because they disagreed with state intervention in religious matters.) Wiki says: ‘It stands today as the most important burial place in the UK of 19^th century Congregational, Baptist, Methodist and Salvation Army ministers and educationalists’. Indeed, William and Catherine Booth, founders of the SA are buried here, along with their son Branwell and other SA commissioners. There’s a real sense of wilderness in this cemetery; it’s been used as a backdrop for Amy Winehouse’s music video for Back to Black, and interestingly, was used to represent Highgate Cemetery in Waking the Dead series 2. Why didn’t they just use Highgate…..?

Brompton Cemetery

Opened in 1840 in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, this is the only cemetery owned by the Crown and managed by the Royal Parks. Its 40-acre site is ‘one of Britain’s oldest and most distinguished garden cemeteries’ according to Wiki. It’s still open for burials and has a Visitor Centre! It is Grade 1 listed in the English Heritage Register of Parks and Gardens of Special Historic Interest. The location has been used for the following films: Sherlock Holmes, Stormbreaker, Goldeneye and Johnny English. Famous people buried here include: Henry Cole, Founder of the Victoria and Albert Museum, the Royal Albert Hall and the Royal College of Music. Emmeline Pankhurst, prominent suffragette. John Snow, epidemiologist and anaesthetist who discovered the link between cholera and infected water. Sir Thomas Spencer Wells, President of the Royal College of Surgeons.

An unusual memorial!

Nunhead Cemetery

Opened in 1840, originally known as All Saints Cemetery, this is somewhat larger than the others at 52 acres and known for its ‘meandering paths’ according to Wiki. The cemetery had become overgrown with wild vegetation until the Friends of Nunhead Cemetery was formed to renovate and protect the monuments. With the help of Heritage Lottery funding paths were cleared and monuments were restored to make it the delightful place to wander in today. It’s now a local nature reserve and is an important habitat for birds and animals, retaining a woodland feel while being completely accessible. The cemetery has several interesting structures, including an octagonal Gothic chapel. (Gothic was a fashionable look in Victorian times, wasn’t it?) An episode of the BBC series Spooks was filmed here, but as with Abney Park, it was supposed to represent Highgate!