London Road Cemetery, Coventry, England
Record Id: 2142
The following is from the English Heritage Register of Parks and Gardens of Special Historic Interest.
HISTORIC DEVELOPMENT
In October 1843 the Board of Health stated that Coventry's high mortality rate was much aggravated by the inadequate size of the city centre burial grounds, little enlarged during a period when the city's population rose from under 6000 to over 30,000. In October 1845, the year after the city acquired an enabling bill to purchase the site, Joseph Paxton (1803-65) was commissioned to design and lay out a new public cemetery on Barnes Field and Quarry Close, former Lammas lands on the edge of Coventry. Part of the site was a former stone quarry, and the resultant landscape of hillocks and hollows, surrounded by rows of mature elms, was incorporated as one of the main features of the cemetery's design. A Terrace Walk formed part of Paxton's original design for the site, seats were installed in 1849, and by 1867 the cemetery was 'resorted to' by a large number of visitors, a contemporary account describing it as having 'more the air of a gentlemen's park than a city of the dead' (London Road Cemetery 1994, [1]). Work began on the two chapels (one Anglican, the other for Nonconformists), boundary wall and lodge in early 1847; the first interments, in the northern, Anglican part of the site, took place in December 1847. The high proportion of Anglican burials caused a further piece of land to be consecrated in 1853, and in the following year a scheme was drawn up to close all other burial grounds in the city. In 1863 an area of 500 square yards adjoining the railway line was purchased for a Jewish burial ground. In 1866 the Paxton Memorial Committee obtained permission to erect a monument in the cemetery to Paxton.
In 1886 the cemetery was extended beyond the London & North Western railway line which formed the southern boundary of the site, the two parts of the cemetery being linked by an iron bridge over the railway. A further extension was made in 1929.
Interment continued in 1997; c 6500 burials had been made by that time.
Site timeline
1866: The Paxton Memorial Committee obtained permission to erect a monument in the cemetery to Paxton.
1886: The cemetery was extended beyond the London & North Western railway line.
1929: A further extension was made.
People associated with this site
Sculptor: S. Barfield
Architect: Joseph Goddard (born 11/04/1840 died 10/10/1900)
Designer: Sir Joseph Paxton (born 03/08/1803 died 08/06/1865)
Architect: John Robertson
Architect: George Henry Stokes (born 1827 died 1874)
Features
terraced walk
Feature created: 1847
Creator: Sir Joseph Paxton (born 03/08/1803 died 08/06/1865)
The monumental, straight, Terrace Walk (walls listed grade II) serves two functions: it provides a visual and auditory barrier between the cemetery and London Road, and provides a promenade giving views west across the burial ground.
Designation status: English Heritage Listed Building Designation Grade II
sculpture
Feature created: 1866
Creator: Joseph Goddard (born 11/04/1840 died 10/10/1900)
Memorial to Joseph Paxton. Of stone, and not unlike an Eleanor Cross with pink granite colonnettes rising up the side, the structure was designed by Joseph Goddard.
Designation status: English Heritage Listed Building Designation Grade II
gate lodge
Feature created: 1847
Creator: John Robertson
The lodge is a two-storey Italianate building with a hipped roof and, on its north-west corner, a slightly taller square tower.
Designation status: English Heritage Listed Building Designation Grade II
screen
A screen with gates, the arcaded screen walls, again Italianate in style, being interrupted by piers carrying shrouded urns.
Designation status: English Heritage Listed Building Designation Grade II
gazebo
The Prospect Tower, an octagonal gazebo which stands on the corner of the cemetery overlooking London Road.
Designation status: English Heritage Listed Building Designation Grade II
chapel
Feature created: 1847
Creator: George Henry Stokes (born 1827 died 1874)
The Nonconformist chapel stands on relatively level and open ground. It too is of 1847 and probably by G H Stokes, and is in the form of a Classical temple of two giant storeys with fluted Ionic columns in antis with single-storey, three-bay pavilions to either side.
Designation status: English Heritage Listed Building Designation Grade II*
War memorial
A 1914-18 memorial to employees of the Triumph and Gloria companies.
building
Feature created: 1967 to 1999
A late 20th-century brick garage and service building for the cemetery's maintenance staff.
War memorial
Great War memorial cross.
lawn
drive
A network of paths and drives which loops and curves around the hillocks and dells give the site its topographical distinctiveness.
entrance
An inwardly splayed arched carriage entrance, wherein the cortege would enter the cemetery, has been bricked up since c 1939 when it was converted to an air raid shelter.
ornamental bridge
Feature created: After 1886
Iron bridge over the railway.
tree feature
© Copyright Parks and Gardens Data Services Ltd. 2007