A Last Ride on the Rails: The London Burial Crisis and the Train to Eternity

[EndtheMadnessNow]

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Proposed solutions to the burial crisis, 1852. A ring of new cemeteries had opened outside the built-up area of London, but were only a temporary solution. Edwin Chadwick planned two large new cemeteries just outside the boundaries of the Metropolitan Burial District, while the promoters of the Necropolis scheme planned a single large cemetery far enough from the metropolis so as never to be affected by urban growth, to be reached by railway. (Based on a map in Clarke (2004), p. 2)

Historically the LNC had invested much of its income from burials and fares, and used the dividends from these investments to pay for cemetery upkeep. Although Alliance Property kept the name "London Necropolis Company" for its funeral business, it was a property developer with no interest in the funeral industry, and saw little reason to spend large amounts maintaining the cemetery, proceeding with the proposed crematorium, or promoting new burials of bodies or cremated remains. The rising popularity of cremation meant the rate of burials was at a historic low, while the Victorian character of the cemetery had fallen out of fashion. The income from burials was insufficient to maintain the cemetery grounds, and the cemetery began to revert to wilderness. Over the course of the 1960s most undertaking work at Brookwood came to an end.



In March 1985 the company was bought by Ramadan Güney, whose family owned the cemetery until it was purchased by Woking Borough Council in December 2014. The Guney family embarked on a programme of building links with London's mosques to encourage new burials in the cemetery. [see note 25]:



London Necropolis Company (Wiki)

NEXT STOP ETERNITY...

THE END OF THE LINE

On Friday, 11th April, 1941, the body of Chelsea Pensioner Edward Irish (1868 - 1941) left the London Necropolis Station en route for Brookwood.

Few who witnessed the departing cortege on that April day would have realised that they were watching the end of a remarkable chapter in London's bizarre history.

Five days later, on the night of the 16th/17th of April, 1941, a German bombing raid on the area destroyed the company's rolling stock, along with much of the building.

The Southern Railway's Divisional Engineer, having inspected the damage at 2pm, on April, 17th, 1941, reported starkly, "Necropolis and buildings demolished."

Although the offices and the first class entrance from Westminster Bridge Road had survived, the devastation effectively sounded the death knell for the Necropolis Railway, and, on the 11th of May 1941, the station was officially declared closed.

Following the end of the Second World War, it was decided not to resuscitate the station, and the site and surviving buildings were sold.

Nowadays, few people who pass the ornate building at number 121, Westminster Bridge Road take the time to pay it a second glance, and few of those who notice it realise that they are gazing upon a building that was once the operational hub of one of Britain's most unique and unusual railway lines.

R.I.P. The London Necropolis Railway.

BRITAIN'S STRANGEST RAILWAY LINE

I couldn't find it on youtube, but here's a eerie tune from Collected Machine Music by Plinth - The London Necropolis Company.