Monument To Susanna Wesley, South Enclosure

Monument to Susanna Wesley, South Enclosure

The headstone of Susanna Wesley, dating from 1936, is a replica of an earlier monument. It is constructed of sandstone, whitewashed in part, and features a shaped top with an inscription on one side. The inscription records details of Susanna Wesley's life through the men connected to her: the Reverend Samuel Wesley MA, her husband; her father, the Reverend Samuel Annesley DD, who was ejected by the Act of Uniformity from the Rectory of St Giles Cripplegate in 1662; and two of her nineteen children, the Reverends John and Charles Wesley, "the former of whom was under God the Founder of the Societies of the People called Methodists".

Susanna Wesley (1669–1742) was a theological writer and educator, most celebrated as the mother of the Methodist pioneers John and Charles Wesley. Born in 1669 at 7 Spital Yard, London, into a Puritan family, she demonstrated remarkable independence at age twelve when she elected to separate from Nonconformist ranks and join the Established Church. She became acquainted with the young Dissenter Samuel Wesley, and after he had rejoined the Anglican fold and begun his path to ordination, they married in 1688. The marriage lasted forty-six years and produced as many as nineteen children.

From 1691, the family lived in rural Lincolnshire, where Samuel ministered to various parishes. Susanna, with little domestic help and limited resources, managed both the household and acted as tutor to her children, including unusually for the period, her daughters. At John's request, she wrote an account of her educational methods, published after her death as "On educating my family", which became her most influential work and continues to inform advocates of home schooling today. Susanna temporarily reverted to Nonconformity in the winter of 1711–12, when, during her husband's absence in London, she presided over up to two hundred of his parishioners at outdoor services. This may have influenced John's later practice of promoting meetings outside church hours and allowing women to lead them. Samuel died in 1735, and in 1739 Susanna returned to London to live with John at his headquarters in City Road, where she spent the last four years of her life as a Methodist.

Bunhill Fields was first enclosed as a burial ground in 1665. Its location just outside the City boundary and its independence from any Established place of worship made it London's principal Nonconformist cemetery, the burial place of John Bunyan, Daniel Defoe, William Blake, and other leading religious and intellectual figures. The ground was closed for burials in 1853, laid out as a public park in 1867, and re-landscaped following war damage by Bridgewater and Shepheard in 1964–65. The monument is located within the Grade I registered Bunhill Fields Burial Ground and has group value with other listed monuments in the south enclosure.