Taphophile Tours. Brompton Cemetery – Part One

The London borough of Kensington and Chelsea is synonymous with wealth and affluence. It’s the go to district for Russian Oligarchs and Arab tycoons. Snapping up multi-million pound pads and frequenting them for five days of the year. It’s only fitting that an area of such extravagant wealth contains a burial ground of considerable elegance. A short walk from Fulham Broadway tube station just past Stamford Bridge stadium are the vast grounds of Brompton Cemetery, West London’s most chic hangout for the dead. A member of the magnificent seven – the name given to the group of large fashionable London cemeteries established in the 19th century, not a group of superheroes – Brompton is to West London what Highgate is to the north of the city. Opened in 1840 to cater for London’s exploding population of the late Georgian period which left traditional churchyards unable to cope with the increasing number citizens arranging consultations with the grim reaper. The cemetery is an elegant half mile long homage to the dead featuring 35,000 graves containing over 200,000 remains. Following the footpath around the perimeter gives you a pretty good idea of why it’s called a garden cemetery. Long abandoned tombstones give way to weathered tree trunks and expanding bushes. Earthy paths lead to dead ends of anonymous gravesites with eroded blank headstones. The sheer clutter of graves is overwhelming. Wonky tombstones lean against each other like crooked teeth in an overcrowded mouth. Despite being the eternal home of almost a quarter of a million dead you’ll see plenty of life. As you navigate your way over fallen branches and the reaching arms of thorny shrubs the sound of trampling footsteps and heavy panting break the silence. Joggers zip past you doing their best to postpone the day they will join the residents of the very place they are doing laps of. Squirrels dart over headstones as they are chased by one of the many dogs out for afternoon walkies. Owners shout orders at their pooch fearful of being caught by the warden for ignoring the sign indicating that canines must be kept on a lead. You may even get winked at by a coy looking gentleman as, somewhat inexplicably, Brompton has a reputation as a popular gay cruising ground. Apparently looking at memorials to deceased Victorian families gets some guys in the mood for some lovin’. Each to their own. Chief Long Wolf is not the kind of name you’d think to associate with a Victorian cemetery near Earl’s Court but for 105 years the Sioux warrior was buried here. He had died while touring with a Buffalo Bill show in London in 1892. Back in those days burials at sea were popular. This practice involved chucking a corpse overboard like an empty barrel of rum as soon as they’d sailed away from port. Avoiding this watery end the Chief was buried in Brompton and forgotten about until 1997. In what must have been a dazzlingly bizarre sight a as trio present day tribesman, complete with feather head dresses, came to pick up Long Wolf and shipped him back to South Dakota. The story of Long Wolf’s adventures are made even more outlandish by the fact that the chiefs reunion with his homeland was orchestrated by a random housewife from Worcestershire  who had stumbled across his grave after reading about him in an old book. Apparently touring with Buffalo Bill was basically a death sentence, no health and safety law back then, as the Wolfman was joined by the ultra-patriotically named Paul Eagle Star who had also died on tour from a broken ankle sustained while falling off of a horse. Buffalo Bill must have put on one hell of a show.

Look out for part two which takes a peek into the spooky catacombs to check out their gruesome contents.

Esteban.