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Kensal Green Cemetery is a burial ground located in Kensal Green, London, England. It was immortalised in the lines of G. K. Chesterton "For there is good news yet to hear and fine things to be seen; Before we go to Paradise by way of Kensal Green".
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History
It was incorporated in 1832 by The General Cemetery Company and is the oldest of the 'Magnificent Seven' cemeteries still in operation. It is the only such cemetery established by an Act of Parliament with a mandate that its bodies may not be exhumed and cremated or the land sold for development. Once the cemetery has exhausted all its interment space and can no longer function as a cemetery the mandate requires that it remains a memorial park. The General Cemetery Company constructed and runs the West London Crematorium within the grounds of Kensal Green Cemetery. More cremations than earth interments take place these days.
Whilst borrowing from the ideals established at Père Lachaise in Paris some years before, the Kensal Green Cemetery project was used as a design and management basis for many cemetery projects throughout the British Empire of the time. In Australia for example The Necropolis at Rookwood 1868 and Picturesque Waverley Cemetery 1877 both in Sydney are noted for their use of the "Gardenesque" landscape qualities and importantly self sustaining management structures championed by The General Cemetery Company.
The cemetery is the burial site of approximately 250,000 individuals in 65,000 graves, including upwards of 500 members of the British nobility and 550 people listed in the Dictionary of National Biography. A garden style cemetery, Kensal Green is the oldest of seven private Victorian cemeteries located in the outskirts of London. Adjacent to Kensal Green is St. Mary's Roman Catholic Cemetery.
Notable structures
Many buildings and structures within Kensal Green are listed. The Anglican Chapel is listed grade I, while the non-conformist Mortuary Chapel, main entrance, Wakeman Road gateway, colonnade/catacomb and perimeter walls and railings are listed grade II or II*. Of the many tombs, memorials and mausoleums, eight are listed grade II.
Notable burials
Interred at Kensal Green is Marigold Frances Churchill, the daughter of Sir Winston Churchill and Lady Clementine who died from a fever in 1921 at age three. Also interred are two children of King George III of the United Kingdom, who desired to be buried at Kensal Green instead of Windsor Castle: Princess Sophia and her brother, Prince Augustus Frederick, Duke of Sussex.
Other burials include:
- Henry Ainley (1879–1945), actor
- Thomas Allom (1804–1872), artist and architect
- Charles Babbage (1791–1871), mathematician, computer scientist
- George Percy Badger (1815– 1888), English Anglican missionary and scholar of oriental studies
- Michael William Balfe (1808–1870), composer
- James Barry (1795–1865), surgeon
- George Birkbeck (1776–1841), doctor, academic and adult education pioneer
- Julius Benedict (1804–1885), composer
- Charles Blondin (1824–1897), acrobat, tightrope-walker
- Sir George Ferguson Bowen (1821–1899), colonial administrator and 9th Governor of Hong Kong
- Lady Diamantina Bowen (c. 1832/1833–1893), grand dame
- John Braham (1774–1856), singer
- George Bridgetower (1782–1860), West Indian-Polish violin virtuoso and friend of Beethoven
- Louis de la Bourdonnais (1795–1840), chess master
- Robert Brown (botanist) (1773–1858), botanist, discoverer of Brownian motion
- Isambard Kingdom Brunel (1806–1859), engineer
- Marc Isambard Brunel (1769–1849), engineer
- Sir Augustus Wall Callcott (1779–1844), painter
- Lady Maria Callcott (1785–1842), travel writer
- John Edward Carew (1785–1868), sculptor
- Sir Ernest Cassel (1852–1921), merchant banker
- Wilkie Collins (1824–1889), author
- Andrew Ducrow (1793–1842), circus performer and horse-rider
- Willie Edouin (1841–1908), comedian, actor and theatre manager
- Hugh Falconer (1808–1865), naturalist
- Edward Francis Fitzwilliam (1824–1857), composer
- Fanny Fitzwilliam (1801–1854), actress, singer and theatre manager
- Marcus Garvey (1887–1940), black nationalist (subsequently exhumed and buried in Jamaica)
- Bill George (1802–1881), Victorian dog dealer, London celebrity
- Thomas Hood (1799–1845), poet, humorist and journalist
- Philip Hardwick (1792–1870), architect
- Philip Charles Hardwick (1822–1892), architect
- Catherine Hayes (1818–1861), opera singer
- James Henry Leigh Hunt (1784–1859), Romantic critic, essayist and poet
- Fanny Kemble (1809–1893), famous British actress and author
- Marian Kukiel, (1885–1973) Polish General and MOD in exile during World War II
- William Garrett Lewis (b. before 1834; d. 1885) pastor of Westbourne Grove Church
- John Graham Lough (1789–1876) , sculptor
- Alexander McDonnell (1798–1835), chess master
- Richard Graves MacDonnell (1814–1881), colonial administrator and 6th Governor of Hong Kong
- Kitty Melrose (1883–1912), actress
- Freddie Mercury (1946–1991), singer (cremated here; ashes scattered on the shores of Lake Geneva, near Montreux, Switzerland)
- Ras Andargachew Messai (1902–1981), Ethiopian ruler
- John Maddison Morton (1811-1891), playwright
- John Lothrop Motley (1814–1877), American historian
- Cuthbert Ottaway (1850–1878) first captain of the England football team
- Robert Owen (memorial) (1771–1858), industrialist and major social reformer
- John Thomas Perceval (1803–1876), army officer, writer and campaigner
- Harold Pinter (1930–2008), playwright, actor, director, screenwriter, poet and political activist
- John Wigham Richardson (1837–1908), shipbuilder
- John Shaw Jr (1803–1870), architect and brother in law of Philip Hardwick listed above
- Sir William Siemens (1823–1883), industrialist
- Robert William Sievier (1794–1865), sculptor (also member of Cemetery board)
- William Henry Smith (1792–1865), businessman
- William Makepeace Thackeray (1811–1863), writer
- Lydia Thompson (1838–1908), dancer and actress
- Therese Tietjens (1831–1877), famous opera singer
- Anthony Trollope (1815–1882), novelist
- J. Stuart Russell (1816–1895), theologian and author
- William Vincent Wallace (1812–1865), composer
- Thomas Wakley (1795–1862), surgeon, campaigner and founder of The Lancet
- John William Waterhouse (1849–1917), artist
- E A Worthington (1791–1880), artist and author
- Dwarkanath Tagore (1794-1846), Bengali industrialist and benefactor
At the centre is All Souls' Chapel, containing several tombs as well. There is also a catacomb currently not maintained.
See also
References
- Liza Picard (2006). Victorian London. Orion. pp. 361–365. ISBN 0-7538-2090-0.
External links
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Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Kensal Green Cemetery |
- Friends of the Cemetery
- 54 high-quality Kensal Green photos (London Cemetery Project): no caption
- London's Victorian Garden Cemeteries
- Website in memory of the Hardwick & Shaw family of London.
- Poets buried in the Magnificent Seven London Cemeteries
- The Official Website of Kensal Green Cemetery
- Recent photos (including the 2007 openday) and information on Kensal Green Cemetery
- album of photos taken in the cemetery in early 2007
Coordinates: 51°31′43″N 0°13′27″W / 51.5286°N 0.2241°W
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