1

Bristol
Friends of Arnos Vale Cemetery
Info: Richard Smith
(+44 0117 957 3066)

Set up by an 1837 Act of Parliament and opened in 1840, this cemetery of 48 acres has always been in private ownership.
Designed by a group of local architects,
it was planned in the style of a Greek necropolis and landscaped using trees and plants noted in classic legend. There are two Doric lodges, two chapels and some magnificent memorials, many Grade II* listed. The Friends came into being as the Association for the Preservation of Arnos Vale Cemetery in 1987 and did what they could to prevent neglect and unsuitable development against unco-operative owners. Events brought these difficulties to public attention two years ago and it is now in local authority ownership while the Friends consider a Trust.

2

Brookwood
The Brookwood Cemetery Society
Info: Ann Armstrong
(+44 01483 276391)

Brookwood Cemetery's original owners, the London Necropolis Company, claimed its 450 acres as the largest cemetery in the world, and its wooded land as "the ideal burying grounds" away from the overcrowded conditions of London. The first burial was in 1854. A feature of Brookwood was the private train and railway platform at Waterloo Station which took deceased and mourners to Brookwood's own stations. Today the cemetery is privately owned and the owner has carried out improvements.

Brookwood Cemetery, Cemetery Office, Cemetery Pales:
Brookwood, Woking Surrey
GU22 0BL
Tel: +44 01483 472222
Web: www.tbcs.org.uk

3

Leicester
Friends of Welford Road Cemetery
Info: John Aston
(+44 0116 288 4132)

Though initiated by the Dissenters, the cemetery was opened for all the borough of Leicester in 1849. Designed as a place of resort by Hamilton & Medland, it is now managed by the Leicester City Council with a view to restoring it as an amenity.
It is listed in the English Heritage Register of Parks and Gardens. In the 30 acres there are over 200,000 interments in 40,000 graves. The memorials represent a wealth of local and family history which the Friends, who were established in 1999, will make available worldwide on the internet.

4

London
Friends of Brompton Cemetery
West Brompton SW10
Info: Arthur Tait
(+44 020 7352 5127)

Brompton (originally the West of London and Westminster Cemetery) covers 40 acres, with about 230,000 burials. It has an unusually formal layout with classical chapel and arcades designed by Benjamin Baud. The cost proved too much for the shareholders who welcomed the government’s intention under the Metropolitan Interments Act 1850 to purchase all the London cemeteries for reasons of public health. The Burial Act 1852 repealed that but allowed this particular purchase to proceed and it has remained the only nationalised public cemetery. It is now managed by the Royal Parks Agency under the Department of Culture, Media and Sport.

5

London
Friends of Hampstead Cemetery
Fortune Green Road N16

Opened in 1876, Hampstead Cemetery was established as a municipal burial grounds and Camden London Borough Council are the current owners. Initially the site comprised some 20 acres. It was landscaped by Joseph Meston, possibly the most important landscape gardener of the 1880s and most of his original plan was followed. Charles Bell designed the two linked chapels and the gate lodge – all now listed buildings. A further five acres were added at the close of the century. Improvements are now taking place

Friends of Hampstead Cemetery
69 Fortune Green Road
London NW6 1DR

6

London
Friends of Highgate Cemetery
Highgate N6

The 37 acres of Highgate Cemetery are divided into two approximately equal areas by Swains Lane. Established in 1839, it prospered until the Second World War, but lack of burials eventually brought about its decline. FOHC was founded in 1975, and in 1981 when the owners planned to close the prestigious Western side permanently, the freehold of the cemetery was acquired and is now held by the Official Custodian for Charities. FOHC is solely responsible for the management of the whole cemetery with volunteers and a small paid staff. It is listed as a place of outstanding historical and architectural interest with several Grade I listed buildings. FOHC has received a Europa Nostra award for the Circle of Lebanon "for the inspiring conservation by a voluntary organisation, of an important part of a famous historic cemetery, using the best principles of minimum intervention."

Highgate Cemetery:
Swains Lane, London
N6 6PJ
Tel: +44 020 8340 1834
Web: www.highgate-cemetery.org

7

London
Friends of Kensal Green Cemetery
Kensal Green W10
Web: www.kensalgreen.co.uk

Founded in 1832, Kensal Green was the first of the seven great private cemeteries and is the only one still owned and managed by its foundation body, the General Cemetery Company. It retains all of its original buildings – listed Grade II and II* - and an impressive array of royal mausoleums and catacombs. All of its 77 acres have been designated a "conservation area of outstanding importance"

8

London
Friends of Nunhead Cemetery
Linden Grove SE15
Web: www.fonc.org.uk

Opened in 1840, Nunhead Cemetery was one of several established around London by commercial companies and promoted by Parliament in an attempt to stop the unhygienic overcrowding of churchyards. It was a fashionable burial ground and popular leisure park for many years but the 52 acres gradually declined into a wilderness and was vandalised when abandoned by the owners in 1969. The London Borough of Southwark took possession in 1974. FONC formed in 1981, with a view to monitoring the Council's plans, has developed into an association of wide interests. It carries out practical work under licence from the Council. Improvements are being completed this year as a result of a grant from the National Heritage Lottery Fund.

9

London
Friends of Tower Hamlets Cemetery Park
Southern Grove, Mile End E3
Web: www.towerhamletscemetery.org

This disused cemetery of 29 acres is the largest area of woodland in east London. The cemetery was one of the first seven to emerge in London in the 1830s, opening as the City of London and Tower Hamlets Cemetery in 1841. It closed for burials in 1963 and eventually passed into the ownership of the London Borough of Tower Hamlets. The environmental education centre, the Soanes Centre, is located in the cemetery. The cemetery, which is primarily sycamore woodland, was designated a Local Nature Reserve (LNR) by English Nature in 2001. The Friends were formed in 1990 and work mainly on the environmental side, in close cooperation with the East London History Society, who handle genealogical and historical matters.

10

London
Friends of West Norwood Cemetery
West Norwood SE27
Web: www.anoraque.demon.co.uk/fownc/index.htm

The South Metropolitan Cemetery was established at (Lower) Norwood by Act of Parliament in 1837. The 40 acre cemetery was very fashionable - over 200 of those buried there are commemorated in the Dictionary of National Biography. The catacombs and 65 memorials are listed Grade II (seven Grade II*).
Lambeth Council compulsorily purchased the cemetery in 1965; they cleared 30-40 per cent of the tombstones to make way for new burials and two of the listed monuments disappeared. The Friends succeeded in ending the policy of wholesale clearance and , following a Diocesan Consistory Court, Lambeth restored certain monuments; they also implemented a management committee and an advisory group which includes the Friends. Major plans for restoration work and a visitor centre are being discussed.

11

London
Friends of the Rosary
Norwich, Rosary Road
Info: Mark Shopland
(+ 44 01603 462240)

The Rosary Cemetery was the first non-denominational cemetery in the country, licensed in 1821.
The Rev Thomas Drummond, appalled by the overfilled state of the churchyards in Norwich, built the terraced cemetery on six acres of the hillside just outside. Today, cared for by the Norwich City Council, after a hard fought campaign to save the cemetery from a "modernisation" scheme which could have destroyed many tombstones and the unique terraces, the Rosary provides a history-rich, quiet retreat with a fine range of late Georgian and Victorian monuments in a setting which has won an environmental award.

12

Southampton
Friends of Southampton Old Cemetery
adjoining The Common, off Hill Lane
Info: (+44 023 8063 8650)

The 27-acre cemetery was opened in 1846, one of the first to be owned and controlled by a local authority, Southampton City Council. The recently formed Friends are working with the council and it is hoped to develop a social heritage centre. The cemetery was set out as a garden of remembrance and has several memorials to shipwrecks, graves associated with the Titanic, cholera burials and famous persons such as Gordon of Khartoum.

13

York
Friends ofYork Cemetery
Info: +44 01904 610578

This 24 acre cemetery was established in 1837 by the York Cemetery Company, both the grounds and the chapel being designed by James Piggot Pritchett. Following the liquidation of the company in 1966 and after several years of neglect, the York Cemetery Trust acquired the freehold in 1987 and, with the Friends of York Cemetery, has since restored the chapel and gatehouse and maintains the grounds in an ecological way. A fulltime warden and gravedigger/maintainer are employed by the Trust.

Friends of York Cemetery
C/o The Cemetery Gatehouse
Cemetery Road, York
YO10 5AJ (01904 610578)