Abney Park Cemetery

Back in April, on a visit with Tiff in London, we ventured up Kingsland Road to Stoke Newington.  It’s much more artsy and Bohemian than Tiff’s Dalston neighborhood.  What I recently discovered is that beginning in the eighteenth-century, it was a haven for non-conformists (i.e., people whose religion was NOT Church of England – Methodists, Baptists, Quakers, and the like).  There was even a college there called the Dissenting Academy for young men who were denied entrance to Oxford and Cambridge because they were not members of the Church of England.  English novelist Daniel Defoe, also a dissenter, was born and lived in Stoke Newington.  BTW, Edgar Allan Poe, though not a dissenter, also lived in Stoke Newington; he attended Manor House school there from age 8 to 11 -- 1817-1820 ( I was totally unaware of Poe's British connections).

Walking down one of Stoke Newington’s crowded streets, I noticed an interesting-looking cemetery.  Actually, I couldn’t see much of the cemetery – just a sign and the huge Egyptian revival entrance gates.  Tiff’s friend Tony, who was with us that day, affirmed that it was an old cemetery and that we should check it out after we got a bit to eat and checked out the farmers’ market.  Nowadays, Stoke Newington is also a haven for organic foodies!

So, that’s what we did:  we entered the gates of Abney Park Cemetery.  It was founded in 1840 as a privately-owned garden-style cemetery, based on the Mount Auburn model in Massachusetts.   Being in Stoke Newington, it was also a cemetery for non-conformists.  It was very well-planned by landscape designers, and initially it contained a rose garden and an arboretum, with trees in A to Z order surrounding the edge of the 32-acre cemetery.

Among the people buried there are William Booth, who founded the Salvation Army (sorry, no picture of his grave).  Another non-conformist interred at Abney Park was Henry Richard, a Welshman, known as “The Apostle of Peace,” an anti-war protestor and promoter of religious freedom.

Isaac Watt, “The Father of English Hymnody,” while not buried in the cemetery, did live at Abney House, the estate upon which the cemetery was built.  There is a large statue of him in the cemetery.  Two of Watts’s best-known hymns are “Oh God, Our Help in Ages Past” and “When I Survey the Wondrous Cross.”

Nearby Watts’s statue is the cemetery’s Gothic church, which was built specifically for non-denominational services.  Unfortunately it was pretty much destroyed by fire in the 1970s, but you can still peek in the ruins.

Today, the Abney Park Cemetery is owned by a trust that is maintaining it as a cemetery and a park.  The graves are in major disrepair, but it is a wonderful green space in the heart of a well-populated London suburb.  The day we visited there were a lot of people, walking their dogs, taking photos, admiring the gravestones, reading the newspaper...



The Bostock family was into wild animals -- they apparently brought African and Asian live specimens to London for people to see. 



It is charming and magical; many videos are shot there – including Amy Winehouse’s  “Back to Black” (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w1evzhSast8), in which you get a few glimpses of some graves and the Gothic chapel.   It is also a venue for cultural, artistic and musical events.  Next month, on July 2, there’s a Blues/Folk Festival in the cemetery.  Cool! 

For more information about Abney Park Cemetery see
http://www.abney-park.org.uk/Abney_Park_Trust_website/Welcome.html

Photos by Tiff -- taken on her Iphone.