Perimeter Wall, Gates And Railings To St George'S Gardens

TQ3082SW 798-1/90/1868

CAMDEN HANDEL STREET Perimeter wall, gates and railings to St George's Gardens

(Formerly Listed as: HANDEL STREET Walls, lodge, cottage & monuments in St George's Gardens)

14/05/74

GV II

Includes: Perimeter wall, gates and railings to St George's Gardens HENRIETTA MEWS. Includes: Perimeter wall, gates and railings to St George's Gardens HEATHCOTE STREET. Includes: Perimeter wall, gates and railings to St George's Gardens WAKEFIELD STREET.

Graveyard wall. c1713, with some local repairs of later date. Red brick with stone coping to piers. Wrought-iron gates, c1884, to Heathcote Street, cast-iron railings to Wakefield Street, with wrought-iron railings at eastern end, c1884. Later brick infills between original piers along Henrietta Mews. Dividing wall between burial grounds of St George's, Bloomsbury, and St George the Martyr, Holborn, survives in western part of gardens. The south-west corner is now separated and used as a playground. The wall is lined with tomb stones formerly located within the burial ground.

HISTORICAL NOTE: this three acre burial ground was acquired in 1713 to serve the new churches of St George, Bloomsbury Way (qv), and St George the Martyr, Queen Square (qv). The two cemeteries were divided by a brick wall which originally ran along the whole length of the burial grounds. Famous persons buried here included Anne, daughter of Richard, Protector Cromwell (d.1727), the painter Jonathan Richardson (d.1745), and the anti-slavery campaigner Zachary Macaulay (d.1838).

The burial grounds were closed c1854. After a period of neglect they were reopened as public gardens in 1885 and 1889. The present garden layout was designed by William Holmes in 1881 (plan in Holborn Library). The gardens are listed grade II* on the English Heritage Register of Historic Parks and Gardens.

(Survey of London: Vol. XXIV, King's Cross Neighbourhood, St Pancras IV: London: 1952: 77-79).

Listing NGR: TQ3041682478