2.30pm-4pm
National Cemeteries Week recognises and celebrates the contribution of Cemetery Friends groups – volunteers who help to protect, interpret, and safeguard cemeteries throughout the UK.
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In celebration of this week, our Friends of West Norwood Cemetery volunteer group welcome you to join a tour led by Friend of West Norwood Cemetery, Andrea Woodside. This tour will expand on the history and significance of London's Magnificent Seven, of which West Norwood was the second to be established in 1837. Offering insight into the circumstances which prompted the creation of these fascinating and historically important spaces, the tour will explore Victorian attitudes towards death and mourning and consider funereal symbolism and what it can tell us about beliefs and social practices and etiquette during the Victorian era.
Hear the extraordinary stories of some key Victorians such as Mrs Isabella Beeton, Sir Henry Tate, and Dr William Marsden, as well as some of the more recent residents including Joe Hunte, and Oswald Denniston, both of whom arrived in the UK on the Windrush in 1948. The tour will also take in the remarkable Greek Enclosure, established in July of 1842 as the resting place of many notable Greek merchants such as John Peter Ralli. The newly restored St. Stephen's Mortuary Chapel is a sight to behold; established in 1872 by Stephen Ralli in memory of his son Augustus, the chapel was designed in Greek Revival style, quite possibly by famed architect John Oldrid Scott.
Advance booking is by donation (minimum £1 + 2% EVB fee) and essential due to limited places HERE
West Norwood Cemetery
One of the Magnificent Seven Cemeteries set up by private companies between 1833 and 1841 to provide for London’s expanding population, West Norwood Cemetery is the resting place of around 200,000 people, including over 300 with entries in the New Dictionary of National Biography. This 42-acre site is home to a wide range of stylised grave stones and monuments, including Gothic, Classical, Italianate and Egyptian. It is testament to the commercial expansion of nineteenth-century memorial masonry which leaves modern visitors of a sense of being able to literally touch history.
Please note due to the nature of the tour’s content, this tour is not suitable for children under the age of 12. Dogs, even on lead, are not allowed in the cemetery. Please wear suitable footwear as some of the ground is uneven and may be slippery after rain.
Tour timings: please meet your tour guide by the main entrance archway in good time for a prompt start at 2.30pm. The tour will be finished by 4.00pm.
How to get here: West Norwood Cemetery and Crematorium SE27 9JU can be found next to St Luke's Church and West Norwood Library. Buses: 2, 68, 196, 315, 322, 432 and 468 (several of these routes go via Brixton Tube Station: 2, 196, 322, 432). Get off at Robson Road stop. Nearest rail station: West Norwood Station (trains to and from London Bridge/Victoria)
