Brompton Cemetery is located near Earl's Court in West London, England (postal districts SW5 and SW10), in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea. It is managed by The Royal Parks, and is one of the Magnificent Seven cemeteries. Established by Act of Parliament, it opened in 1840 and was originally known as the West of London and Westminster Cemetery.

Consecrated by the Bishop of London in June 1840, it is one of Britain's oldest and most distinguished garden cemeteries. Some 35,000 monuments, from simple headstones to substantial mausolea, mark the resting place of more than 205,000 burials. The site includes large plots for family mausolea, and common graves where coffins are piled deep into the earth, as well as a small columbarium. Brompton was closed to burials between 1952 and 1996, but is once again a working cemetery, with plots for interments and a 'Garden of Remembrance' for the deposit of cremated remains.

Location

The official address of Brompton Cemetery is Old Brompton Road in West Brompton, SW10, in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea. The Main Gate (or North Gate) is near the junction with Kempsford Gardens. There is another gate (the South Gate), located on the Fulham Road near the junction with Hortensia Road.

History

The cemetery was one of seven large, modern cemeteries founded by private companies in the mid-19th century (sometimes called the 'Magnificent Seven') forming a ring around the edge of London. The inner city burial grounds, mostly churchyards, had long been unable to cope with the number of burials and were seen as a hazard to health and an undignified way to treat the dead.

Brompton Cemetery was designed by Benjamin Baud and has at its centre a modest domed chapel (in the style of the basilica of St. Peter's in Rome) at it southern end, reached by long colonnades, and flanked by catacombs. The chapel is dated 1839. The site, previously market gardens, was bought from Lord Kensington and is 39 acres (160,000 m2) in area. The cemetery was designed to give the feel of a large open air cathedral. It is rectangular in shape with the north end pointing to the northwest and the south end to the southeast. It has a central "nave" which runs from Old Brompton Road towards the central colonnade and chapel.

Below the colonnades are catacombs which were originally conceived as a cheaper alternative burial to having a plot in the grounds of the cemetery. Unfortunately, the catacombs were not a success and only about 500 of the many thousands of places in them were sold. There is also an entrance on the south side from the Fulham Road. The Metropolitan Interments Act 1850 gave the government powers to purchase commercial cemeteries. The shareholders of the cemetery were relieved to be able to sell their shares as the cost of building the cemetery had overrun and they had seen little return on their investment.

It is listed as Grade II* in the English Heritage Register of Parks and Gardens of Special Historic Interest in England and five of the individual monuments are listed as Grade II.[2]

Buried in the cemetery are 289 Commonwealth service personnel of World War I and 79 of World War II, whose graves are registered and maintained by the Commonwealth War Graves Commission, a few of whom are instanced in the list of Notable Interments (below).[3] The majority of war graves are contained in a railed section to the west (also containing 19th century servicemen graves)

Trivia

Beatrix Potter, who lived in The Boltons nearby, may have taken the names of some of her characters from tombstones in the cemetery. Names of people buried there included Mr. Nutkins, Mr. McGregor, Mr Brock, Mr Tod, Jeremiah Fisher and even a Peter Rabbett, although it is not known for certain if there were tombstones with these names.[4][5]

The cemetery has a reputation for being a popular cruising ground for gay men.[6]

Brompton Cemetery has featured in a number of films, including David Cronenberg's Eastern Promises (starring Viggo Mortensen), The Wisdom of Crocodiles (Jude Law), Guy Ritchie's Sherlock Holmes (also with Jude Law) as the location of 'Lord Blackwood's Tomb', Crush (Imelda Staunton and Andie MacDowell), Stormbreaker (starring Alex Pettyfer, Ewan McGregor, Stephen Fry and Mickey Rourke), Finding Neverland (starring Johnny Depp and Kate Winslet) and Johnny English (starring Rowan Atkinson); The Wings of the Dove (starring Helena Bonham Carter), as well as being used as a location by photographers such as Bruce Weber (see "The Chop Suey Club").

Notable interments

Famous occupants of the cemetery include:

• Charles Aldin - Victorian Builder
• Alexander Anderson – Royal Marines general
• Franciszek Arciszewski - Polish general
• Tomasz Arciszewski – Polish socialist politician
• Sir Frederick Arthur - British officer
• James Atkinson – surgeon, artist and Persian scholar
• William Edward Ayrton – physicist
• Samuel Baker – explorer
• Sir Squire Bancroft – actor and theatre impresario
• Metropolitan Anthony (Bloom) of Sourozh – Russian Orthodox émigré metropolitan archbishop and author*
• Joseph Bonomi the Younger – sculptor, artist, Egyptologist and museum curator
• George Borrow – author, traveller and linguist
• Peter Borthwick MP
• Sir Leslie Brass - lawyer and civil servant
• Fanny Brawne – John Keats' muse, buried under her married name, Frances Lindon
• Sir James Browne – engineer
• Francis Trevelyan Buckland – zoologist
• Field Marshal John Fox Burgoyne and his son, Hugh Burgoyne RN - Victoria Cross recipient
• Henry James Byron – actor and dramatist
• General William Martin Cafe – Indian Mutiny hero and VC recipient
• Sir William Wellington Cairns - Australian administrator after whom the city of Cairns is named
• Louis Campbell-Johnston (1861-1929) - founder of the British Humane Association
• Marchesa Luisa Casati – infamous Italian quaintrelle, muse, eccentric and patron of the arts
• John Graham Chambers – founder of the Amateur Athletic Association
• Hugh Childers - Liberal statesman
• Charles Coborn – music hall singer and comedian
• Henry Cole – founder of the Victoria and Albert Museum, the Royal Albert Hall, the Royal College of Music, the 1851 Great Exhibition and inventor of the Christmas card
• Robert Coombes – champion professional sculler
• Joseph Thomas Clover – pioneer of anaesthesia
• Hiram Codd - inventor of the Codd bottle
• Thomas Crofton Croker – Irish antiquary, devoted to the collection of Irish poetry and folkore
• William Crookes – chemist and physicist
• Samuel Cunard – founder of the Cunard Line
• Thomas Cundy III – architect
• Sir James Bevan Edwards - army officer
• Corporal Joseph John Farmer – VC recipient
• Nellie Farren - Victorian stage actress
• Henry Farrer - artist
• Terence Feely – playwright and author
• Captain Alfred Kirke Ffrench – VC recipient of Indian Mutiny
• Lieutenant-General Sir Charles Craufurd Fraser – VC recipient
• Admiral Charles Fremantle – explorer, founded the Swan River Colony (Western Australia) and the city of Fremantle which bears his name
• Walter Forbes, 18th Lord Forbes
• Robert Fortune – Scottish botanist who introduced tea plant from China to India
• Sir John Fowler, 1st Baronet - railway engineer
• Tom Foy - comedian
• Thomas Robert Froy - Musician
• William Nathaniel Froy - Victorian Builders Merchant
• Princes George and Emanuel Galitzine - film producer and Spitfire pilot respectively
• Brian Glover (1934 - 1997) – television and film actor
• John William Godward – painter
• George Godwin – architect, journalist, and editor of The Builder magazine
• George Goldie – "founded" Nigeria
• Dr Benjamin Golding - founder of Charing Cross Hospital
• Field Marshall Frederick Haines
• Corporal Thomas Hancock – VC recipient (unmarked grave)
• Sir Augustus Harris - actor
• John Harrison – Royal Navy VC recipient
• Thomas Helmore – choirmaster and author of books on plainsong
• Admiral Algernon Heneage
• Tim Hetherington – photojournalist
• Rowley Hill - Bishop of Sodor
• Sir Harold Hood, 2nd Baronet
• Colonel William Hope – VC recipient
• John Jackson – boxer
• Geraldine Jewsbury – writer
• Michał Karaszewicz-Tokarzewski - founder of a Polish resistance unit in WWII and war hero
• Mary Anne Keeley – actress
• Robert Keeley – actor and comedian
• William Claude Kirby – first chairman of Chelsea Football Club
• Constant Lambert – composer and conductor
• Kit Lambert – music producer and original manager of The Who
• Percy E. Lambert – racing car driver
• Nat Langham – middleweight bare-knuckle fighter
• John Leslie-Melville, 9th Earl of Leven
• Frederick Richards Leyland – Liverpool shipowner and art collector
• Bernard Levin – journalist, author and broadcaster
• Ralph Robert Wheeler Lingen, 1st Baron Lingen (1819-1905)
• Johann Carl Ludwig Loeffler - manager of Siemens Brothers
• Marie Lohr – actress
• Archibald Low – inventor and author of science books
• David Lyon MP
• Wiktor Łomidze - Georgian-Polish Navy officer
• James Adair McConnochie - civil engineer
• Henry McGee (1929 - 2006) – actor
• John Benjamin Macneill - railway engineer
• General Sir Frederick Francis Maude – VC recipient
• Henry Augustus Mears – founder of Chelsea Football Club
• Boyd Merriman, 1st Baron Merriman (1880-1962)
• Lionel Monckton – composer of Edwardian musical comedies
• Henrietta Moraes – writer, artist's model and muse to Francis Bacon
• Roderick Murchison – geologist, originator of the Silurian system
• Mausoleum to the Naylor-Leyland baronets
• Adelaide Neilson – actress
• William Gustavus Nicholson, 1st Baron Nicholson – first Chief of the Imperial General Staff
• Count Stanisław Julian Ostroróg, photographer
• Eugène Oudin – American baritone
• Sydney Owenson, Lady Morgan – Anglo-Irish writer
• Sir William Palliser – inventor and builder of Barons Court
• Emmeline Pankhurst – leading suffragette
• Private Samuel Parkes – VC recipient
• Mrs Howard Paul - actress and singer
• Charles Henry Pearson and his brother Sir John Pearson
• Sir John Lysaght Pennefather – Army general
• Henry Pettitt - actor, a noteworthy monument with a sculpted head of Pettitt
• Percy Sinclair Pilcher – inventor and pioneering aviator
• Valentine Cameron Prinsep – Pre-Raphaelite painter
• Sir Robert Rawlinson - military officer
• William Henry Macleod Read – political and social activist and merchant
• Fanny Ronalds – American socialite and singer
• William Michael Rooke – Irish composer
• Blanche Roosevelt – American opera singer and author
• Tim Rose – American singer-songwriter
• Alexander Rotinoff - architect
• William Howard Russell – journalist and war correspondent
• Sir Doyle Money Shaw - naval officer
• William Siborne – Army officer and military historian, maker of the Siborne model
• Felicjan Slawoj Skladkowski, prime minister of Poland
• Samuel Smiles – biographer and inventor of "self-help"
• Albert Richard Smith – writer
• John Snow – anaesthetist and epidemiologist, who demonstrated the link between cholera and infected water
• Farren Soutar - Edwardian musical comedy actor
• Dr James Startin - pioneer of human skin diseases
• H.F. Stephens – light railway pioneer
• Robert Story, poet
• Fred Sullivan, Thomas Sullivan and Mary Clementina Sullivan – the brother, father and mother of Arthur Sullivan, composer of Gilbert and Sullivan fame. It was originally planned that Arthur would also be buried there until Queen Victoria insisted on his interment in St Paul's Cathedral.
• Richard Tauber – operatic tenor
• Sir David Tennant - Speaker of the Cape Parliament.
• William Terriss – actor
• Ernest Thesiger – character actor, The Old Dark House and Bride of Frankenstein
• Frederic Thesiger, 1st Baron Chelmsford – jurist and statesman
• Frederic Augustus Thesiger, 2nd Baron Chelmsford – Commander-in-Chief in the Zulu War
• John Evan Thomas - sculptor
• Brandon Thomas – author of Charley's Aunt
• Charles Blacker Vignoles – railway engineer, and inventor of the Vignoles rail
• Colonel Richard Wadeson – VC recipient
• Edward Wadsworth – artist
• Thomas Attwood Walmisley – composer and organist.
• Sir Robert Warburton – Anglo-Indian soldier and administrator
• Flight Sub Lieutenant Reginald Alexander John Warneford – VC recipient
• Sir Philip Watts – naval architect, designer of the Elswick cruiser and the HMS Dreadnought
• Sir Andrew Scott Waugh – army officer and surveyor, who named the highest mountain in the world after Sir George Everest
• Benjamin Nottingham Webster – actor, theatre manager and playwright
• Sir Thomas Spencer Wells – surgeon to Queen Victoria, medical professor and president of the Royal College of Surgeons of England
• Private Francis Wheatley – VC recipient
• Sir William Fenwick Williams – general, pasha and governor
• John Wisden – cricketer and founder of Wisden Cricketers' Almanack
• Bennet Woodcroft – textile manufacturer, industrial archaeologist, pioneer of marine propulsion, prime mover in patent reform and the first clerk to the commissioners of patents
• Thomas Wright – antiquarian and writer
• Johannes Zukertort – chess master
• Harriett Mordaunt - former wife of Sir Charles Mordaunt

The Native American Sioux chief, Long Wolf, a veteran of the Sioux wars was buried here on 13 June 1892 having died age 59 of bronchial pneumonia while taking part in the European tour of Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show. He shared the grave with a 17-month-old Sioux girl named White Star believed to have fallen from her mother's arms while on horseback. 105 years later a British woman named Elizabeth Knight traced his family and campaigned with them to have his remains returned to the land of his birth. In 1997, Chief Long Wolf was finally moved to a new plot in the Wolf Creek Cemetery (ancestral burial ground of the Oglala Sioux tribe) at Pine Ridge, South Dakota. His great grandson John Black Feather said "Back then, they had burials at sea, they did ask his wife if she wanted to take him home and she figured that as soon as they hit the water they would throw him overboard, so that's why they left him here."

There was another Sioux tribesman buried in Brompton named Paul Eagle Star. His plot was in the same section as Oglala Sioux warrior Surrounded By the Enemy who died in 1887 from a lung infection at age 22. Like Long Wolf, he took part of Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show. Paul died a few days after breaking his ankle when he fell off a horse in August 1891. His casket was exhumed in spring of 1999 by his grandchildren, Moses and Lucy Eagle Star. The reburial took place in Rosebud's Lakota cemetery. Philip James accompanied the repatriation.

Little Chief and Good Robe's eighteen month old son, Red Penny who travelled in Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show is also buried here. The resting places of both Surrounded and Red Penny remain a mystery.