Brompton Cemetery
was opened in 1840.
It is a Conservation Area
and is listed  in the English Heritage Parks and Gardens Register and  it is also
classed as a Site of Nature Conservation and
Metropolitan Open Land.
Brompton is one of the
so-called Magnificent Seven cemeteries, which opened
in an irregular circle around London between 1833
and 1841.
In common with the others, Brompton was established
as a commercial concern
and sited in open country.
The founder of the West
of London and Westminster Cemetery, as it was originally called, was Stephen Geary,
an architect and inventor,

who had previously founded cemeteries at Highgate
and Nunhead.
The site, purchased from
Lord Kensington, was
a simple flat rectangle
half a mile long without
any trees because it
had formerly been
a market garden.
The directors held an open competition for the cemetery architecture and appointed
the most eminent architect
of the day, Jeffry Wyattville,
to judge it.
He chose the design
submitted by Benjamin Baud,
one of his assistants
who had worked with him
at Windsor Castle.
Brompton remains the only cemetery to be nationalised
and is now a Royal Park.