South Ealing Cemetery

The Cemetery was opened in 1861 by the Ealing and Old Brentford Burial Board, which had been formed in 1858 when burial space in the parish churchyard was running out. The 8-acre site that was purchased for the purpose in 1860 was accessible to both Ealing and Brentford. In 1863 Ealing became a separate district from Brentford, and the cemetery was later known as South Ealing Cemetery. The cemetery was laid out with a series of straight drives having circular areas at intersections. An axial yew-lined drive leads from the main entrance to two circular beds, one planted with yew and containing tombs, the second with a deodar; the walk across the axis between these two circles is now unnecessarily accentuated by birch planting. The Gothic style cemetery buildings were designed by Charles Jones (1830-1913), Surveyor to the Local Board from 1863 and later Borough Engineer, who was instrumental in much of Ealing's development. His buildings here included 2 lodges, stone gate piers with crocketed capitals, railings and a pair of chapels for Anglicans and Non-conformists joined by a porte-cochère.

Now bordered by housing, the cemetery was once adjacent to Ealing Local Board's Refuse Destructor or rubbish incinerator, an innovation that Charles Jones had introduced as a means of handling waste, first used in the North of England. He patented an adaptation of the existing design that reduced exhaust residue and made paving slabs from the clinker.

In 1907 a further 13 acres of land at the rear was added and consecrated by the Bishop of Kensington, at which time a memorial window in the chapel was unveiled to commemorate the late Vicar of St Paul's Brentford, Revd. Haydon Frederick Nelson. He had been Chair of the Ealing and Old Brentford Burial Board from 1893-1906 and was buried in a prominent position in the cemetery. A further extension was opened in 1940, consecrated by the Bishop of London with an entrance on Popes Lane with stone gate piers.

Within the older part of the cemetery the planting is mainly sycamore, some holly and a boundary planting of yew. Meller praises the 'magnificent magnolia trees' and the cemetery's 'air of a country churchyard'. There are good C19th monuments and among the illustrious people buried here are the Rt Hon Spencer Walpole (d.1898), Conservative MP and Secretary of State for the Home Office in the 1850s and '60s after whom Walpole Park (q.v.) is named and who owned Pitshanger Manor; Lionel Walter (d.1965), Premier Earl of Scotland for 23 years; Sir Stephen Walcott (d.1887), Chief Colonial Land and Emigration Commissioner in Canada. On the tomb of Mr Lucas, Director of the Brilliant Sign Company (d.1953), his name is shown in gold leaf behind glass. There is an extensive Polish section in the newer cemetery, evidence of Ealing's large Polish community. The cemetery is now closed to new burials, and only used for burials in re-opened family owned graves.