EPSOM AND EWELL CEMETERY - Page 2

A number of buildings around Epsom were converted into emergency military hospitals in 1914-1918, for example the new grandstand at the Racecourse, the Army camp at Woodcote Park and Horton Hospital. Some of the patients who died were buried in a section of Epsom Cemetery. After the War, the Imperial War Graves Commission (later called the Commonwealth War Graves Commission) set about consolidating and standardizing war burials. A representative visited in 1921 to advise on the layout and maintenance and his plans were implemented following their receipt in September 1922. Epsom was also asked to maintain 62 Canadian War Graves. This sector is a rectangular site enclosed by a beech hedge. On the northern side a white stone screen was erected with bronze panels listing the eighty nine commonwealth service men who had died of wounds. The temporary grave markers were removed and replaced with tablets set into the lawn. The War Cross is in the centre of the lawn approached by paved steps. The War Graves Commission's horticultural concept was to create an environment where visitors could experience a sense of peace in a beautiful and serene setting akin to a country garden. When they inspected in 1926 the grass looked coarse, and Epsom Council had to cut it more frequently to improve the quality.

Links to the war memorials in this cemetery Local Council War Memorial and CWGC Memorial

Lord Rosebery proposed having a separate War Memorial for fallen Epsom men in the market place but many families objected to such an obvious reminder of their loss. It was erected instead in the north west corner of the Ashley Road cemetery and unveiled on 13 December 1921. The names of two hundred and sixty fallen Epsom men were recorded on the screening stone wall and this was unveiled by Maj Gen Sir Edward Northey at the Remembrance Day Ceremony in November 1923. Names from the Second World War were added in 1946. White decorative railings with two gates separate the war memorial from the rest of the cemetery as a memorial to the members of the "Royal Fusiliers (City of London Regt ) 18,19, 20 and 21 Btns who fell in the Great War". The centre of each railing contains the insignia of the Public Schools Brigade who were stationed at Woodcote Camp.

By 1923 it was clear that the cemetery required space, even though from 1880 it had been possible to buy the right to bury a number of bodies in a particular plot. (A register of these can be consulted at the EELHC, Bourne Hall, Ewell). Epsom council purchased five acres of land from Lord Rosebery to the south of the existing cemetery, part of field 567 on the Ordnance Survey (OS) map at 25 inches to a mile. Local tradition has it that Lord Rosebery would have given the land for free, but decided to charge £2000 after the Council agreed to games being played in Rosebery Park . He donated the money he received to charity. The new area had to be suitably enclosed with walls and a screen of shrubs and trees, and the adjoining land had to be suitably drained. Further extensions were made subsequently taking in the remainder of field 657 and 561 on the OS map and there is still room for expansion.

Today the Cemetery is still the responsibility of Epsom Borough Council and is looked after by the Superintendent and Registrar. The Non-Conformist chapel was demolished in 1981 when the segregation of different religions was abandoned. It remains an oasis of peace and tranquillity, but many of the older memorials have become damaged and their inscriptions lost.