The London Necropolis Railway
Last ride to the Brookwood Cemetery
In 1854 a new railway service opened in London. It ran only one train a day and its only stop was a cemetery.
In the 1850s the massively crowded city of London began to face a new problem. Its cemeteries were overflowing, and with the outbreak of a major cholera epidemic the problem got even worse. The London government declared that many of its cemeteries were full, and that people would have to be buried elsewhere.
With such a high-demand, it is not surprising that a group of local businessmen came up with an answer. In 1852 they formed The London Necropolis & National Mausoleum Company. Their first act was to purchase 2,000 acres of land near Woking, of which 500 acres were initially set aside to form the Brookwood Cemetery. At the time, it was the largest cemetery in the world.
However, the cemetery was located some twenty-five miles from London, so a system had to be instituted to bring the dead and their mourners to the necropolis. To that end, a new railway station was built right next to Waterloo station in London. From this station, which ran one train a day, funeral parties could ride out to Brookwood Cemetery.
The train journey lasted about 30 minutes and made two stops in different areas of the necropolis. The first stop served the area of the cemetery reserved for Anglicans. The second stop was for “non-conformists” or, basically, anyone who wasn’t Anglican.
The stations themselves contained bars and, at least one time, hung signs containing the grim pun “Spirits served here”.
In 1917, Brookwood Cemetery was expanded to include a large military graveyard as well. It now includes military graves from both the first and second world wars.
By the 1930s the popularity of the rail-line was in decline and the train was only running a few times a week, when specifically booked for funeral parties.
During the Blitz over London in World War II, the London Necropolis Railway station next to Waterloo was hit by a German bomb and mostly destroyed. The owners of the company decided there was no profit to be found in rebuilding it, and the London Necropolis Railway was officially closed.
Brookwood Cemetery continues to operate to this day. It now contains the graves of over 240,000 people. It is no longer the largest cemetery in the world, but it remains the largest in England. Neither of the necropolis train-stations survive to today. The first was demolished in 1960. The second remained open awhile longer to continue to serve refreshments for mourners, but it burned down in 1967.
