Bunhill Fields - Opening As A Burial Ground

Opening As A Burial Ground

In keeping with this tradition, in 1665 the City of London Corporation decided to use some of the fen or moor fields as a common burial ground for the interment of bodies of inhabitants who had died of the plague and could not be accommodated in the churchyards. Although enclosing walls for the burial ground were completed, the ground was, it appears, never consecrated or actually used by the authorities for burials. Instead, a Mr Tindal took over the lease. He allowed extramural burials in its unconsecrated soil, which became popular with Nonconformists – those citizens of London or surrounding villages who treasured the independence of their religious beliefs and therefore practised Christianity outside of the Church of England. The burial ground, which became known as "Tindal's Burial Ground" attracted mainly dissenters from the Established Church who were of a Protestant persuasion, partly owing to their much larger numbers in the locality than other faiths who did not conform to the Church of England's ways, such as Catholics or Jewish citizens. Nonetheless, the burial ground was open for interment to anyone who could afford the fees.

Something of its 17th-century origins can be seen today in an inscription at the entrance gate to Bunhill Fields: This church-yard was inclosed with a brick wall at the sole charges of the City of London, in the mayoralty of Sir John Lawrence, Knt., Anno Domini 1665; and afterwards the gates thereof were built and finished in the mayoralty of Sir Thomas Bloudworth, Knt., Anno Domini, 1666.

In 1769 an Act of Parliament gave the City of London Corporation the right to continue to lease the ground from the prebendal estate for a further 99 years. This enabled the City authorities to continue to let the ground to their tenant as a burial ground; although in 1781 the Corporation decided to take over the management of the burial ground directly.

So many historically important Protestant nonconformists chose this as their place of interment, that the 19th-century poet and writer Robert Southey gave Bunhill Fields the appellation "the Campo Santo of the Dissenters"; a phrase that also came to be commonly applied to its "daughter" cemetery at Abney Park.

Thousands of Quakers (members of the Religious Society of Friends) are buried in the neighbouring Quaker Burying Ground. This was purchased as the burial place for London Quakers in 1661, becoming their first freehold burial land in London.