Kensal Green Cemetery

  Kensal Green Cemetery

Opened January 1833

KensalGreen Cemetery was the first commercial cemetery in London. There was a need for larger cemeteries at the time has the population in the cities have expanded and all the normal burial grounds were become full to the brim. In 1832 parliament passed a bill that set the way for new cemeteries to be build around London. These cemeteries would become the magnificence seven which Kensal Green was the first one of them to be built.

The General Cemetery Company was formed and had purchased the land at Kensal Green in 1831 in anticipation of the bill being passed. They then promoted a competition for someone to design the cemetery. There was 46 entrants to the competition and the winner was Mr Henry EdwardKendall (1776-1875). Kendall's wining design was in a Gothic style but it was a neo-classical Greek Revival Style that was build. It was the chairman of the General Cemetery Company who preferred the Greek Style, He ask the companies surveyor a Mr John Griffith to draw up new designs and it was his designs that were built and what you see today.

The cemetery is 54 acres in size and was originally divided up into an Anglican section 39 acres and Non-conformists section 15 acres. The small nonconformist section is oval in shape and has a neo-classicalchapel with catacombs and is at the eastern end of the cemetery. In the western part of the cemetery there is a very dominate Anglican chapel that is set upon a terrace. This chapel was built with catacombs beneath it. The chapel had a hydraulic lift for easy lowering of the coffins down below.

There are three separate catacombs at Kensal Green there were intended for lead-sealed coffins that were triple-shelled. The catacomb under the north terrace is now sealed forever and the catacomb under the nonconformist chapel was damage during the 2^ndworld war and is also close and sealed. The only one that is still in operation is the catacomb under the Anglican chapel which is in the center of the cemetery. The catacomb has space for 4000 deposits and has vaults for family groups. Burial within these catacombs were far more expensive than being buried up above in a plot. These catacombs became popular with the unmarried and childless couples who have no family plots else where. The catacombs were more expensive in the begin but that was just a one off payment that cover the whole funeral. Where as if you were buried up above after the funeral cost you would have to spend more cash on a monument or mausoleum that could be very expensive but this was the Victorian way.

The cemetery at Kensal Green is a very quiet place to have a walk around and grab your thoughts. It also has some very fine monuments to look at. I would recommend it to any tourist to go and have a look around and see what it has to offer. It also so has the effect of transporting you back to the Victorian times as if by magic you get a real sense of what the Victorians were about.