Longfellow.
Besides the churchyards of Tooting, Plumstead, Lee, and Eltham, that are still available for interments, and some others, such as Charlton and Fulham, where burials in existing graves or vaults are sanctioned on application to the Home Secretary, ten burial-grounds, which can hardly be called cemeteries, are still being used in London. These are the South Street or Garratt’s Lane ground at Wandsworth, consecrated in 1808, where widows, widowers, and parents of deceased persons already interred there can be buried, and the Holly Lane ground in Hampstead, which was consecrated in 1812, and is occasionally used; the graveyard by the Friends’ Meeting-House in Stoke Newington, those in the convents in King Street, Hammersmith, and Portobello Road, and one in Newgate Gaol (to all of which I have referred); and a burial-ground crowded with tombstones behind St. Thomas’ Roman Catholic Church in Fulham, where new graves are still dug, although there appears to be no room for more monuments, and although densely-populated streets are on every side. The other three are Jewish grounds, one in Ball’s Pond, N., and two in Mile End, E., and they are described in [Chapter VIII.]
It will be noticed that when the Act was passed, under which the metropolitan burial-grounds were to be closed, seven of the new cemeteries were already in use, and while the burial-grounds were being closed, other cemeteries were being started.
The Act for the formation of Kensal Green Cemetery was passed in 1832, after unremitting efforts on the part of Mr. G. F. Carden. It is situated by the Harrow Road, not far short of Willesden Junction, and when first made was practically in the country. Now it is in the midst of large colonies of small houses. It has, as is usual, a consecrated and an unconsecrated portion, with a chapel in each. Its establishment led the way to the formation of other cemeteries, but most of the later ones were acquired by the parishes, not started by companies.
Several of the large cemeteries which have thus sprung into existence are just outside the metropolitan area, but the following are within the boundary of the County of London, and are tabulated in the order in which they were established:—
NAME OF CEMETERY. | SIZE IN ACRES. | DATE OF FIRST INTER- MENT. | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1. | All Souls’ Cemetery, Kensal Green, W. | 69¼ | 1833 |
| 2. | The South Metropolitan Cemetery, Norwood, S.E. | 40 | 1838 |
| 3. | St. James’ Cemetery, Highgate, N.W. | 38 | 1839 |
| 4. | Abney Park Cemetery, Stoke Newington, N. | 32 | 1840 |
| 5. | Brompton Cemetery, or the West London, or London and Westminster Cemetery, W. | 38 | 1840 |
| 6. | All Saints’ Cemetery, Nunhead, S.E. | 50 | 1840 |
| 7. | City of London and Tower Hamlets Cemetery, South Grove, Mile End, E. | 33 | 1841 |
| 8. | Lambeth Cemetery, Tooting Graveney, S.W. | 41 | 1854 |
| 9. | Charlton Cemetery, S.E. | 8 | 1855 |
| 10. | St. Mary’s Cemetery, Putney, Putney Lower Common, S.W. | 3 | 1855 |
| 11. | Woolwich Cemetery, Wickham Lane, S.E. | 32 | 1856 |
| 12. | Camberwell Cemetery, Peckham Rye. S.E. | 29½ | 1856 |
| 13. | Greenwich Hospital Cemetery, Westcombe, S.E. | 6 | 1857 |
| 14. | Deptford Cemetery (St. Paul’s), Lewisham, S.E. | 17 | 1858 |
| 15. | St. Mary’s Roman Catholic Cemetery, Kensal Green, W. | 30 | 1858 |
| 16. | Lewisham Cemetery, S.E. | 15½ | 1858 |
| 17. | St. Mary’s Cemetery, Battersea, S.W. | 8½ | 1860 |
| 18. | Fulham Cemetery, S.W, | 12½ | 1865 |
| 19. | Hammersmith Cemetery, Fulham, S.W. | 16½ | 1869 |
| 20. | Lee Cemetery, Hither Green, S.E. | 10 | 1873 |
| 21. | Hampstead Cemetery, Fortune Green, N.W. | 19¼ | 1876 |
| 22. | Wandsworth Cemetery, Magdalen Road, S.W. | 12 | 1878 |
| 23. | Plumstead Cemetery, S.E. | 32¼ | 1890 |
| 24. | Greenwich Cemetery | 15 | |
| Total | 608¼ |
Some of these cemeteries have been added to since they were first formed, and, considering the rate at which they are being used, they will all need to be enlarged in a very few years—that is if the present mode of interment continues to be the ordinary one.
SITE OF THE GROUND at WORMWOOD SCRUBS, in the Parish of Hammersmith
It must not be imagined that land was secured for these cemeteries without difficulty. The inhabitants of the districts in which it was proposed to place them naturally petitioned against their formation. A huge scheme for securing ninety-two acres (the Roundwood Farm Estate), between Willesden and Harlesden, for the Great Extramural Cemetery Association, was opposed by the Middlesex magistrates and others, and was not sanctioned by the Secretary of State. Part of this site is now a public park. The parish of Kensington applied for permission to form a cemetery of thirty acres at Wormwood SCRUBS, but had eventually to go as far out of London as Hanwell in order to secure a suitable plot. Unfortunately some public land was allotted. I believe that Norwood Cemetery was formerly a part of Norwood Common, and Putney and Barnes Cemeteries (the latter being just outside the boundary of London) are on Putney and Barnes Commons. The cemetery at Tooting was once meadow-land known as Baggery Mead, and for most of the others farm land and fields were taken. Happily it would now be very difficult to acquire a piece of common or lammas land for any such purpose, as we know far better than we did how to preserve our greatest treasures. How disastrous it would be if, when our village churchyards could no longer be used, the village greens were turned into burial-grounds!