London: Tea Time in Wonderland

Are you fascinated by victorian London? Did the Brompton cemetery left you curious about the Magnificent Seven, built around London when the inner city graveyards could take no more?

We chose a lovely spring Sunday to stroll through the most famous and certainly the most atmospheric.

Highgate cemetary opened its doors in 1839. The gardeners decide to keep its meadow feeling, its countryside feeling. Situated on the side of a hill (131m, one of the highest in North London), it soon proves very popular. If this is, of course, a mourning place… it also becomes a fashionable place for its view of London, its prettyness, its elegant graves… These days, the trees have grown so tall they hide the view but the place remains elegant and serene.

In 1850, it proves so successful the company decides to buy 19 acres down the hill – this becomes East Highgate, the older part naturally renamed West Highgate. A problem arises: the chapel remains on the other side of the road. With so much money put forward for the lanf, there is no way they can afford a second church. However, once consecrated, a body cannot leave a graveyard. What to do? Have the road blessed? Categorically refused. It si finally decided to… dig a tunnel underneath it…

Comes the XXth century. Two wars, less money coming in as incineration is prefered… The west side closes in 1975. Thankfully, a group of volunteers create an association to protect it.

The West side can only be seen through a guided tour (which is sadly not accessible to children under 8. If you are lucky a devoted friend or husband will take the kids to the nearby park – plenty of swings, slides…). It is better to start with the East side anyway (where children are welcome. I even saw mums with a buggy. The entree fee is £3)

If you have already walked through Brompton Cemetary, you will be amazed by the difference. You wouldn’t have realised at the time but it was pretty much a city graveyard – no matter that it was on the outskirts of London. Remember – wide avenues, graves neatly organisez in rows. On a match day, the silence is regularly interrupted by joy or disappointed cries of supporters. No way you can forget civilisation there.

As soon as you step in, your pace changes. Cleared towards the entrance you quicly reach a wooded heart. Very green, very peaceful. Of course, some central avenues give you a guideline but it is so tempting to take one of those small paths between the lanes… It really feels like a walk in the woods. The Little Red Riding hood could appear any time, basket in hand. No wolves here of course, but foxes have been seen at dusk.

Leave the main axes behind. Nature soon claws back, velevery moss, ivy. weeping angels are embracesd by garlands of bright leaves.You’ll notice many army or colonial graves. Other are more simple Mother, Father… And if at first, the rows are quite organised, you will find pretty overcrowded sections!

You will sometimes find graves indicating… the address of the deceased (too many homonyms?)… or showing the sculpted portrait of the favoured dog…

It is very easy to spend your afternoon there, not even thinling of the time once.

oh, don’t forget to visit the most famous local – Karl Marx is buried there with part of his family. Lenin is said to have come regularly while living in London in 1903. Originally, the grave was discreet in a darker side of the cemetary. But revolutionarist friends had it moved to a more prominent position and added this extravagant bust – it really cannot be missed. Even today fresh flowers appear on a daily basis.

Spring is an ideal season to stroll along. The plants carefully planted on graves have happily spread and you will meet bunches of snowdrops, daffodils, muscaris, tulips here and there. Squirrels are much more shy than at Brompton – they would have run towards you, hoping for nuts or a biscuit. Here they’re more likely to disappear within seconds.

Want to know more about the Victorian mourning etiquette? Try Tracy Chevaliers’ Falling Angels which paints its story with hihgate cemeteray as background…

Highgate Cemetary
Swain’s lane
London N66PG

£3 /adult

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