Hither Green Cemetery, Lewisham, London
Visited January 2016
Hither Green Cemetery opened in 1873, and retains the ornamental entrance gates and pair of chapels although the dissenters chapel is now out of use, falling into disrepair and fenced off. The oldest part of the cemetery around the chapels is slightly overgrown, and has a few large monuments. It was later extended but the new area is a rather dull grid of paths and gravestones, with few trees. Adjacent to the cemetery is Hither Green Crematorium, which opened in 1956. One area is set aside for war graves and the war memorial, including a memorial to the pupils and teachers of Sandhurst Road School, who died when the school was hit by a bomb in 1943.
The cemetery is still in use, with modern burials among the Victorian ones - the most recent I saw was only a few days old. This means that even on a grey Sunday the cemetery is busy with cars of grave owners, and a photographer may get a few funny looks.
As well as the graves, the cemetery is known as one of the main roosts of the parakeets which have made south east London their home - the rows of lombardy poplars in particular are full of their shrieks, and flashes of green can be seen flying between the trees.
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