The First Burials at Brookwood: November 1854

This article provides some analysis of the first burials at Brookwood, from 13th - 30th November 1854

The burial registers in 1854 list the following details for each burial: the burial number, name, place of death, date of burial, the age of the deceased, the priest who performed the burial service, the grant number (this often indicates that a memorial is likely to have been placed), from which parish the deceased was removed from, where the grave is (i.e. on the consecrated or unconsecrated side - no further details are listed), and a column for notes. The information that would be very useful but which is not recorded includes: a precise location for the grave (plot numbers had not been allocated in 1854), the date of death, and whether a memorial was actually placed, the grant number alone being no guarantee of this.

A basic analysis of the November 1854 burials may be found in Table 1; Table 2 gives a full transcription of the first month's burials at Brookwood, laid out in a similar manner to the register itself. A total of 43 burials took place in two and a half weeks, split almost equally between the Consecrated and Unconsecrated sections (21 to 22 respectively), and the division between males and females (22 each, due to the stillborn male twins) The youngest person buried (excluding stillborn children) was George Wicks, aged 3 days (No. 7); the oldest was Charlotte Edwards, aged 74 years (No. 4), buried on the first day of business. The maximum number of burials catered for on any one day was seven (28th November); whilst on two days, the 14th and 26th, no funerals took place.

A total of ten different London parishes are represented: St Saviour’s Southwark (16 burials), St Luke’s Chelsea (12), Islington (2), Clerkenwell (1), St Pancras (1), St Giles’s Bloomsbury (7), St James’s Clerkenwell (1), St Thomas’s Southwark (1), St Marylebone (1), and St Bartholomew (1). Of these parishes, only the first (St Saviour’s) has been positively identified, covering plots 89 and 90 on the Consecrated side and plots 116 and 117 on the Unconsecrated side. It is not yet known whether the other parishes had distinct sections and, if so, where these are or were.

The first burial took place in the Unconsecrated section, in the parish plot of St Saviour’s Southwark, so this can be traced to plot 116 or 117. However, the first burial in the Church of England section did not take place until 18th November, in the St Luke’s Chelsea area, which has yet to be identified. The first date when the number of Church of England burials exceeded those for Dissenters was 21st November. The priests who conducted the services were both employed by the Necropolis Company for the opening of the Cemetery. It is interesting to note that the Rev. Atchison conducted the funeral of Lt. Gen. Sir H. Goldfinch, when the executors might have chosen a member of the local clergy from St. Marylebone to officiate instead.

Some similar addresses recur for this month. 16 Canonbury Park Villas (Nos. 9 and 18) reveal that brother and sister were buried a few days from one another. Then there is Ewer Street (Nos. 1 and 6), and both these entries refer to stillborn children. A number of former inmates of the St. Saviour’s Workhouse are represented by Nos. 2, 3, 5, 7 and 40; and similarly for St Giles’ Workhouse in entries 37 and 38.

One of the most interesting features of these 43 burials (44 counting the stillborn twins) is that 42 (or 43) of them are almost certainly representative of pauper burials, and that none of these is positively identifiable today. Table 3 summarises the details of the ten parishes represented by the burials during this period.

The first burial

Fortunately the first burial in the London Necropolis is in an identifiable parish area, being somewhere in plot 116 or 117.

The first memorial

There are similar ambiguities concerning the first memorial in the cemetery. The burials which took place in November 1854 did result in one private grave, that of Lieutenant-General Sir Henry Goldfinch KCB (1781-1854). This was a private grave, Grant No. 1, with the implication that a permanent memorial was placed. The grave has been located in plot 27, facing onto St Chad’s Avenue. Goldfinch’s burial throws some interesting light on the recording of burials at the time. He is listed as burial No. 26 in the register, but further study shows that burial Nos. 27-29 inclusive pre-date Goldfinch, so that he was in fact the 29th person to be buried. Perhaps this discrepancy was caused by the entries in the register being written up some time afterwards.

Table 1: Analysis of Burials for November 1854

Notes to Table 1

(1) Includes twins

(2) First Church of England burial

(3) Assumed burial site

(4) First date when Church of England burials exceed Nonconformist

(5) First private grave

* Includes twins

Date	Total Burials	Nonconf. Burials	C of E Burials	Female	Male
Week 1
13	4	4	0	2	3* (1)
14	0	0	0	0	0
15	1	1	0	0	1
16	2	2	0	0	2* (1)
17	2	2	0	2	0
18	2	1	1	0	2 (2)
19	1	1? (3)	0	0	1
Summary	12	11	1	4	9

Week 2
20	4	3	1	2	2
21	4	1	3	1	3 (4)
22	4	2	2	4	0
23	1	0	1	0	1
24	3	1	2	1	2
25	1	0	1	0	1 (5)
26	0	0	0	0	0
Summary	17	7	10	8	9

Week 3
27	3	2	1	2	1
28	7	0	7	5	2
29	1	1	0	1	0
30	3	1	2	2	1
Summary	14	4	10	10	4

Summary for Nov	43	22	21	22	22*

Table 2: Burials at Brookwood in November 1854

Table 3: Parish burials at Brookwood in November 1854

Notes to Table 3

(1) Includes twins

Name	Place of Death	When Buried	Age	Service By	Grant No	Parish removed from	CoE	Non	Notes
1. Mrs Hore, still born twins (male)	74 Ewer Street, Boro’	Nov 13th				St Saviour’s Southwark		X	Buried at the expense of parish
2. Elizabeth Costello	St Saviour’s Workhouse	Nov 13th	3 mth	Rev. R G Lemaire		St Saviour’s Southwark		X	Buried at the expense of parish
3. Henry Smith	Workhouse	Nov 13th	31	Rev. R G Lemaire		St Saviour’s Southwark		X	Buried at the expense of parish
4. Charlotte Edwards	Chelsea	Nov 13th	74	Rev. R G Lemaire		St Luke’s Chelsea		X
5. Thomas Myrstall	Workhouse	Nov 15th	66	Rev. R G Lemaire		St Saviour’s Southwark		X	Buried at the expense of parish
6. Ann Sumners still born child (male)	64 Ewer Street	Nov-16th				St Saviour’s Southwark		X	Buried at the expense of parish
7. George Wicks	Workhouse	Nov 16th	3 days	Rev. R G Lemaire		St Saviour’s Southwark		X	Buried at the expense of parish
8. Amelia Jane Sharp	Little Guildford Street	Nov 17th	6 mths	Rev. R G Lemaire		St Saviour’s Southwark		X	Buried at the expense of parish
9. Edward Franks Preeston	16 Canonbury Park Villas North	Nov 18th	11			Islington		X
10. John Bowden	Clerkenwell Prison	Nov 19th		Rev. R G Lemaire		Clerkenwell
11. Matilda Sarah Akast	16 York Street	Nov 17th	6 mths	Rev. R G Lemaire		St Saviour’s Southwark		X	Buried at the expense of parish
12. Henry Read	Manor Street	Nov 18th	35	Rev. H. Aitchison		St Luke’s Chelsea	X		Buried at the expense of parish
13. Catherine Kirby	19 Fishmongers Alley	Nov 20th	63	Rev. R G Lemaire		St Saviour’s Southwark		X	Buried at the expense of parish
14. Henry Brown	20 Hatfield Place	Nov 20th	3 mths	Rev. R G Lemaire		St Saviour’s		X	Buried at the expense of parish
15. Henry Frederick Bacon	12 New Street	Nov 20th	2 mths	Rev. R G Lemaire		St Saviour’s		X	Buried at the expense of parish
16. Mary Carpenter	Workhouse	Nov 20th	63	Rev. H. Aitchison		St Luke’s Chelsea	X		Buried at the expense of parish
17. Eleanor Staneley	12 William Street, Hampstead Road	Nov 22nd	73	Rev. R G Lemaire		St Pancras		X
18. Rachael Ester Maria Preeston	16 Canonbury Park Villas North	Nov 21st	9			Islington		X
19. George Welch	29 Wellington Square	Nov 21st	14 mths	Rev. H. Aitchison		St Luke’s Chelsea	X		Buried at the expense of parish
20. William Russell	1 Mermaid Yard	Nov 21st	3	Rev. H. Aitchison		St Luke’s Chelsea	X		Buried at the expense of parish
21. John Bilson Crouch	5 Exeter Place	Nov 21st	1	Rev. H. Aitchison		St Luke’s Chelsea	X		Buried at the expense of parish
22.Mary Ann Toomey	Adams Place	Nov 22nd	2 mths	Rev. R G Lemaire		St Saviour’s Southwark		X	Buried at the expense of parish
23. Emma Barton	12 Exeter Buildings	Nov 22nd	9 wks	Rev. H. Aitchison		St Luke’s Chelsea	X		Buried at the expense of parish
24. Harriet Kitchen	12 Queen’s Street	Nov 22nd	2	Rev. H. Aitchison		St Luke’s Chelsea	X		Buried at the expense of parish
25. Charles Gaffe	Guy’s Hospital	Nov 23rd	53	Rev. H. Aitchison		St Thomas Southwark	X
26. Lt. Gen. Sir Henry Goldfinch KCB	11 Upper Wimpole Street	Nov 25th	73	Rev. H. Aitchison	No. 1	St Marylebone	X
27. Sara Ann Parry	Pitts Place	Nov 24th	19 mths	Rev. R G Lemaire		St Saviour’s Southwark		X	Buried at the expense of parish
28. John Talbot	9 Charlotte Street	Nov 24th	21 mths	Rev. H. Aitchison		St Luke’s Chelsea	X		Buried at the expense of parish
29. Robert Edward Till	87 New Road	Nov 24th	16 mths	Rev. H. Aitchison		St Luke’s Chelsea	X		Buried at the expense of parish
30. Charles Henry Charlton	2 Middlesex Bartholomew Close	Nov 27th	2y 8m	Rev. H. Aitchison		St Bartholomew the Great	X
31. Teresa Stevenson	35 George Street	Nov 27th	73	Rev. R G Lemaire		St Saviour’s Southwark		X	Buried at the expense of parish
32. Harriet Mayhew	6 Angel Court	Nov 27th	8 mths	Rev. R G Lemaire		St Saviour’s Southwark		X	Buried at the expense of parish
33. Samuel Watts	45 Charles Street, Drury Lane	Nov 28th	6 wks	Rev. H. Aitchison		St Giles’s Bloomsbury	X		Buried at the expense of parish
34. Willia Allen	25 Little Square, Andrew Street	Nov 28th	64	Rev. H. Aitchison		St Giles’s Bloomsbury	X		Buried at the expense of parish
35. Salina Merge	10 Cross Lane	Nov 28th	2	Rev. H. Aitchison		St Giles’s Bloomsbury	X		Buried at the expense of parish
36. Jane Read	7 Shaw Court	Nov 28th	8 mths	Rev. H. Aitchison		St Giles’s Bloomsbury	X		Buried at the expense of parish
37. Emma Dorien	Workhouse	Nov 28th	16	Rev. H. Aitchison		St Giles’s Bloomsbury	X		Buried at the expense of parish
38. Elizabeth Ewin	Workhouse	Nov 28th	7	Rev. H. Aitchison		St Giles’s Bloomsbury	X		Buried at the expense of parish
39. William Eddington	Star Court	Nov 28th	28	Rev. H. Aitchison		St Giles’s Bloomsbury	X		Buried at the expense of parish
40. Ann Maizey	Workhouse	Nov 29th	70	Rev. R G Lemaire		St Saviour’s Southwark		X	Buried at the expense of parish
41. Jane Watmore	6 Turnmill Street, Cow Cross	Nov 30th	33	Rev. R G Lemaire		St James Clerkenwell		X
42. Olive Lucy Huntley Nicholls	13 Doyley Street	Nov 30th	7 wks	Rev. H. Aitchison		St Luke’s Chelsea	X		Buried at the expense of parish
43. Thomas Ditch	5 Danvers Buildings	Nov 30th	19 mths	Rev. H. Aitchison		St Luke’s Chelsea	X		Buried at the expense of parish

Parish	C of E	Nonconf	Total	Female	Male	Total
Clerkenwell	?	?	1	0	1	1
Islington	0	2	2	1	1	2
St Bartholomew’s the Great	1	0	1	0	1	1
St Giles’s, Bloomsbury	7	0	7	5	2	7
St James’ Clerkenwell	0	1	1	1	0	1
St Luke’s, Chelsea	10	1	11	4	7	11
St Marylebone	1	0	1	0	1	1
St Pancras	0	1	1	1	0	1
St Savior’s, Southwark	0	17 (1)	17	9	8 (1)	17
St Thomas’s, Southwark	1	0	1	0	1	1