Tag: Kensal Green Cemetery

A Magnificent Sunset

Early today I watched the Channel 4 broadcast of the first day’s play at the fourth Test Match between India and England.

After lunch I scanned some more colour slides. This is the last of those from Kensal Green Cemetery, made in May 2008. A lengthy preview of Mark Olden’s ‘Murder in Notting Hill’ features the inscription of this grave of Eugene Henry Draggon, known as Jingles. https://www.google.co.uk/books/edition/Murder_in_Notting_Hill/LKRblqxEUDkC?

Late in December of 2008 I received a phone call from an excited John Turpin, who wrote the text of ‘The Magnificent Seven’ informing me that there was a splendid sunset at Kensal Green and urging me to visit and photograph it before it disappeared. I duly obliged.

The last picture in this gallery contains

the rather weather worn memorial to Thomas Taplin Cooke.

According to Wikipedia, he ‘was born in Warwick in 1782 the son of Thomas Cooke and his wife, Mary Ann.[3]

He took over his father’s circus around 1810. In the autumn of 1830, following a pleasurable visit from King William IV and Queen Adelaide, the company adopted the name “Royal Circus” and retained this name for the remainder of their existence.[1]

In 1835 the circus had a semi-permanent structure in Edinburgh (a circular timber structure) at the north end of Lothian Road but this had to be later moved when the Caledonian Railway was built. At this point (c.1850) the circus moved to Nicolson Street, where it was later surplanted by the Empire theatre (now known as the Festival Theatre).[4]

In 1836 he chartered “The Royal Stuart” from Greenock[5] and two smaller vessels to convey the whole circus to America. 40 of the 130 artists were members of the Cooke family. This extended trip included prolonged programmes in New York, Boston and Walnut Street Philadelphia. At this stage their “pattern” was to erect a large circular building of a temporary nature (normally in wood). It is unclear how long this American tour was intended to last, but it met an abrupt end during their stay in  Baltimore on 3 February 1838, when the Front Street Theater burnt down (note- there is some confusion as two “Front Street Theaters burnt down within 5 weeks of each other: Baltimore on 5 Jan 1838, Buffalo on 3 February 1838).[6] The Cookes lost 50 horses and many items of wardrobe and props in this fire.

It appears that the circus had been used to operating from large theatres up to this point. Either during the American tour or following the fire disaster, Taplin Cooke, had a very large circular tent constructed. After a few more months in Philadelphia, he returned to Britain in the summer of 1838 with this large tent, which freed up the possible locations for the circus.[1]

One very dramatic equestrian show was “Mazeppa” based on a poem by Byron, first performed in Philadelphia in 1838 and still playing until at least 1843 when it was showing at Birmingham in England. This concept was borrowed from Andrew Ducrow‘s show Mazeppa of 1831.[7] In 1846 a similar style of show was based on the life of Dick Turpin.’

Cooke died in 1866. His memorial contains a mourning horse and a child reading.

There is further information on details depicted here in the post ‘Where Is The Body?’ The sphinx is from the grave of the above mentioned Andrew Ducrow, and the Raj Guard from that of Gen. Sir William Casement.

A black and white image of William Mulready containing an explanatory plaque appears in ‘Ninon Michaelis’

I know neither whose hat and gloves have fallen with their broken plinth, nor what is being celebrated in this intriguing bas relief.

This evening we repeated yesterday’s excellent Jalfrezi dinner, complete with beverages, which meant I opened another bottle of the Coonawarra Cabernet Sauvignon, and toasted Yvonne.

More Contemporary Tributes

This was another day of unrelenting gloom and rain, on which I scanned another batch of colour slides from

Kensal Green Cemetery in May 2008. Well, they all started out as colour slides before I converted some.

The first of these chapels within the grounds is Anglican; the second Non-conformist.

A single sorrowful sculpture sits atop the plinth dedicated to George and Mary Maugham; while William Holland’s Renaissance style sarcophagus is supported by stone griffons.

antiquesworld.co.uk provides this information about the firm began by William Holland furniture makers:

‘Holland and Sons Antique Furniture (1803 – 1942)

Holland and sons were extremely good cabinet makers and they specialised in fine quality furniture. This is why such pieces are so well collected today as if you buy antique furniture by these makers you know you are buying quality. This English furniture making firm was founded in 1803 by William Holland and by the middle of 1800s, Holland and sons was one of the main competitions to the furniture makers Gillows, one of the greatest English furniture producers in History.

Original they were cabinet makers and upholsterers called Taprelland Holland but by 1843 they changed to Holland and Sons with William Holland in control, a relative of the well known Regency architect Henry Holland.

The business soon started to expand quickly and by1851 they employed over 350 cabinet makers and by 1852 took on the prestigious firm of Thomas Dowbiggin of 23 Mount Street, London, who had previously made the state throne for Victoria’s Coronation. Holland and Sons worked successfully not only as furniture makers but also as undertakers and became responsible for the Duke of Wellington’s funeral.

William Holland has the firm expanding at a rapid rate and became so well known for its quality in cabinet making, they became cabinetmakers and upholsters to the Queen. Their first commission was for Osborne House in 1845, supplying furniture in the Queen’s favourite style of the time, the Louis XVI style from France. They continued to supply furniture for Osborne and gained further commissions for Windsor Castle, Balmoral and Marlborough House. Holland and sons also worked for many leading institutions such as the reform Club (we have also supplied the reform club with our antique furniture in the past), the British Museum and the new Houses of Parliament. They were part of many of the important international Exhibitions including London in 1862, Vienna in 1873 and Paris in 1867 and 1872. They gained worldwide fame for their magnificent designs and super quality in cabinetmaking right throughout the Victorian era. Holland and sons stayed as a family run business but sadly closed in 1942 when it fell on hard times due to the ever changing world of the time.’

A small girl is still adorned with flowers and a necklace.

Like other members of ‘The Magnificent Seven’; unlike modern municipal cemeteries, Kensal Green permits more contemporary tributes. Bob Caxton’s descendants have incorporated a stained glass panel into his stone; a sinuous cut metal figure is fixed to the crucifix standing over Maggie Jones; and Charlie O’Sullivan’s polished memorial bears his photograph and the Irish symbols of shamrock and harp.

This afternoon, having finished reading the first four chapters of

I embarked upon the task of scanning Charles Keeping’s superb illustrations as I work my way through Charles Dickens’s novel. In addition to the frontispiece above, entitled ‘Jerry, the manager of these dancing dogs’, a traditional Victorian street entertainment, I now reproduce

‘I found at my elbow a pretty little girl’ whose innate sadness the artist has seen;

and ‘The dwarf glanced keenly at all present’, depicted as evil personified.

This evening we dined on Jackie’s spicy pasta arrabbiata with which she drank Hoegaarden and I drank more of the Garnacha.

Waterborne Funerals

Starting at 4 a.m. this morning I watched the second day’s play of the second Test Match between India and England broadcast by Channel 4; and this afternoon ITV’s transmission of the Six Nations rugby match between Ireland and France.

Between these two events I scanned more cemetery colour slides from May 2008.

At 19 Kilburn Lane, Kensal Green you will find a splendidly atmospheric gastro pub serving excellent meals and beverages, rejoicing in the name of Paradise by way of Kensal Green. https://www.theparadise.co.uk/private-hire-paradise-by-way-of-kensal-green

Because of Covid restrictions the establishment is currently closed, but we are assured on its website that it will be back.

The name is taken from the final line of G.K.Chesterton’s poem

The Rolling English Road

Before the Roman came to Rye or out to Severn strode,
The rolling English drunkard made the rolling English road.
A reeling road, a rolling road, that rambles round the shire,
And after him the parson ran, the sexton and the squire;
A merry road, a mazy road, and such as we did tread
The night we went to Birmingham by way of Beachy Head.

I knew no harm of Bonaparte and plenty of the Squire,
And for to fight the Frenchman I did not much desire;
But I did bash their baggonets because they came arrayed
To straighten out the crooked road an English drunkard made,
Where you and I went down the lane with ale-mugs in our hands,
The night we went to Glastonbury by way of Goodwin Sands.

His sins they were forgiven him; or why do flowers run
Behind him; and the hedges all strengthening in the sun?
The wild thing went from left to right and knew not which was which,
But the wild rose was above him when they found him in the ditch.
God pardon us, nor harden us; we did not see so clear
The night we went to Bannockburn by way of Brighton Pier.

My friends, we will not go again or ape an ancient rage,
Or stretch the folly of our youth to be the shame of age,
But walk with clearer eyes and ears this path that wandereth,
And see undrugged in evening light the decent inn of death;
For there is good news yet to hear and fine things to be seen,
Before we go to Paradise by way of Kensal Green.

(https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/48212/the-rolling-english-road)

The Kensal Green to which Chesterton refers is a specific section of this West London area.

This is Kensal Green Cemetery, the history and some residents of which are featured in my post “Where Is The Body?”

It is still a working cemetery. Some waterborne funerals still enter through this gate on the canalside.

Alongside the older sections lie the more recent memorials, some of which

bear tributes to loved ones of the deceased, such as Liverpool and Queens Park football clubs and the legendary Bob Marley. I know of no other burial grounds where such adornments would be permitted.

For dinner this evening Jackie produced spicy chicken tikka, plain parathas, and plentiful salad with which she drank Hoegaarden and I finished the Cabernet Sauvignon.

Where Is The Body?

A friend of Aaron managed to tow away his truck which needs a new fuel pump. He hopes to have it repaired as soon as possible.

On another very grey day I scanned more black and white negatives from May 2008 that didn’t appear in The Magnificent Seven publication.

The first selection is from Kensal Green cemetery, opened by The General Cemetery Company in 1833, the oldest of London’s landscaped cemeteries.

‘The Cemetery of All Souls at Kensal Green was the earliest of the large privately-run cemeteries established on the fringes of London to relieve pressure on overcrowded urban churchyards. Its founder George Frederick Carden intended it as an English counterpart to the great Père-Lachaise cemetery in Paris, which he had visited in 1821. In 1830, with the financial backing of the banker Sir John Dean Paul, Carden established the General Cemetery Company, and two years later an Act of Parliament was obtained to develop a 55-acre site at Kensal Green, then among open fields to the west of the metropolis. An architectural competition was held, but the winning entry – a Gothic scheme by HE Kendall – fell foul of Sir John’s classicising tastes, and the surveyor John Griffith of Finsbury was eventually employed both to lay out the grounds and to design the Greek Revival chapels, entrance arch and catacombs, which were built between 1834 and 1837. A sequence of royal burials, beginning in 1843 with that of Prince Augustus Frederick, Duke of Sussex, ensured the cemetery’s popularity. It is still administered by the General Cemetery Company, assisted since 1989 by the Friends of Kensal Green.’ (historicengland.org.uk)

This still working graveyard contains a number of family mausoleums, some of which are now bricked up.

This one is that of Andrew Ducrow (1793-1842)

‘This Graeco-Egyptian mausoleum, designed ostensibly for his wife, but mainly (as the epitaph says) “by genius for the reception of its own remains.” Condemned in The Builder in 1856 as a piece of “ponderous coxcombry. “

Ducrow was a circus stunt rider as well as the owner and producer of the wildly successful hippodramas, The Battle of Waterloo and Mazeppa. Note ……. the flanking sphinxes……… See also winged horse visible on left of relief. Other motifs included shells, beehives, angels etc.’

Caption and commentary by Jacqueline Banerjee 2007′. (http://www.victorianweb.org/art/parks/kensalgreen/13.html)

This memorial to Major General The Hon. Sir William Casement (1788-1844) ‘was’, according to collection.nam.ac.uk, ‘erected in Kensal Green Cemetery by his widow’. ‘He died of cholera at Cossipore (Cossipur or Kashipur) in 1844 shortly before he was due to return to England. Casement delayed his departure when he received a letter requesting him not to return, due to unrest in the Madras Army, that was signed by the members of the Supreme Council (the letter is in British Library). He is buried in Lower Circular Road Cemetery, Kolkata (Calcutta)’ There is, according to Historic England an identical monument in Kolkata. I remain confused about where his remains actually lie.

findagrave.com tells that the resident of the next monument, Sir Samuel Wilson, was ‘Pastoralist and owner of much land in Australia, author of “The Californian Salmon With an Account of its Introduction into Victoria”, Conservative MP for Portsmouth, he was knighted in 1875.’

‘Eustace Meredyth Martin (1816-92) [for whom this resting place was built] was a barrister, traveller and writer. His books include ‘A Tour through India in Lord Canning’s Time’ (1881), ‘A Visit to the Holy Land, Syria and Constantinople’ (1883), and a children’s novel entitled ‘Round the World'(1883)’ (historicengland.org.uk).

A group of Italian families a buried here.

Brompton Cemetery bears the grave of Flight-Sub-Lieut. Reginald Alexander John Warneford, V.C., R.N.A.S..

‘On 7 June 1915 at Ghent, Belgium, Warneford, flying a Morane-Saulnier Type L, attacked another German Army airship, LZ 37. He chased the airship from the coast near Ostend and, despite its defensive machine-gun fire, succeeded in dropping his bombs on it, the last of which set the airship on fire. LZ37 subsequently crashed in Sint-Amandsberg[a] (51°3′43.2″N 3°44′54.7″E).[8] The explosion overturned Warneford’s aircraft and stopped its engine. Having no alternative, Warneford had to land behind enemy lines, but after 35 minutes spent on repairs, he managed to restart the engine just as the Germans realized what was going on, and after yelling “Give my regards to the Kaiser!”, he was able to achieve liftoff and returned to base.[9][1]

On 17 June 1915, Warneford received the award of Légion d’honneur from the French Army Commander in Chief,  General Joffre. Following a celebratory lunch, Warneford travelled to the aerodrome at Buc in order to ferry an aircraft for delivery to the RNAS at Veurne. Having made one short test flight, he then flew a second flight, carrying an American journalist, Henry Beach Needham, as passenger. During a climb to 200 feet, the righthand wings collapsed leading to a catastrophic failure of the airframe. Accounts suggest that neither occupant was harnessed and were both thrown out of the aircraft, suffering fatal injuries. In the case of Needham, death was instantaneous.’ (Wikipedia)

Just 10 days after he earned his V.C. This man died in a flying accident.

Beatrix Potter grew up in the nearby fashionable Kensington, and seemingly spent much of her childhood behind the walls of Brompton Cemetery where it is believed she found inspiration for her characters’ names on the gravestones,

one of which was suitable for a Squirrel.

This evening we dined on more of Jackie’s super-tasty beef and mushroom pie, this time with roast potatoes and parsnips; tender cabbage and runner beans; firm carrots and cauliflower, with thick, meaty, gravy. The Culinary Queen drank Hoegaarden and I finished the La Repasse.