The Life and Death of London's Magnificent Seven Cemeteries

[@mygrammieis]

These places hold so much history and should be respected not abandoned

[@artfromtheheart4391]

A few weeks ago I visited Highgate cemetery and from that moment I decided to do a Grand Tour of the Magnificent Seven. So far three have been visited and I look forward to exploring the rest. This video was a fantastic introduction to the Magnificent Seven and certainly gives one a deeper insight and respect to a bygone culture of mourning. Thank you for making this!

[@lablackzed]

Cemetery's the only place where everyone's equal forever.

[@samakovamk]

A nicely done and respectful video of Londons "seven"....just been to Highgate.....I see Michael Faradays grave in bad decline for someone we all owe a debt too for our modern world........thanks David...and team...regards

[@DrDavidOwens]

Thank you for your compliment. These are great places to visit and it was a joy visit them many times. David

[@annehenderson9207]

A beautifully narrated documentary about lovely places for the dead and the living. Good to know they are being cared for.

[@DrDavidOwens]

I am delighted you enjoyed the video. David

[@janetslicer3637]

A simply magnificent overview of the "magnificent seven." I've seen others but this particular creation does it best! Touché !

[@DrDavidOwens]

Glad you enjoyed it!

[@mapi576]

David, compliments are to be apportioned to your excellent & impressive researching of historical facts. As well as your vocality & voice-over narration of your attentive and diligent cinematography. Hollywood or documentary-films experts must become your employ for your professional content creation ...

[@DrDavidOwens]

Thank you for your kind comments. Delighted you enjoyed the video. I will pass along your compliments to Mike Timms, the narrator. David

[@andreabraun8235]

just love Thomas Sayers grave stone with his dog, absolutely AMAAAAAZING

[@cmamelgna5585]

Absolutely superb video. Packed with history and AMAZING monuments. Thank you.

[@DrDavidOwens]

Many thanks!

[@jorybennett5932]

A very professional presentation, beautifully filmed and narrated.

[@DrDavidOwens]

Thank you for your kind comment. David

[@mterrylane819]

A wonderful presentation with superb music and commentary and very informative the photography leaves a lasting impression

[@DrDavidOwens]

Thank you for your kind comments. Pleased you enjoyed the video. The cemeteries are wonderful.

[@sirrodneydoodlesmom]

Very well done. Enjoyed from America💌

[@josephineleon8550]

Impressive documentary!👏👍

[@DrDavidOwens]

Thank you for your compliment. I enjoyed making it. I learned a lot. David

[@jenny666barnish]

Fantastic! I've visited Highgate but will make sure to visit the others. Very inspiring

[@unrulysoldier2140]

Stunningly delivered. Well done !!

[@stewartwebb5699]

I've visited most and it can be a lovely day out. Beautiful statues and reading the many headstones. I love Victorian history and the connection these bring to that story

[@greywebs1944]

Great documentary on these cemeteries, I've only ever been to Highgate on two occasions that was about 30 years ago. But still fascinating to look round. Kensal Green Catacombs I'd like to visit 🤞

[@DrDavidOwens]

Glad you enjoyed it

[@greywebs1944]

@@DrDavidOwens Always love this 👍 They don't know us, we don't know them. Full respects always 🌟

[@brianingarfill1773]

great interesting program and thank you Mike Timms for your wonderfully relaxing narrative

[@dinx556]

Brilliantly done, thank you.

[@388Caroline]

Thank you, beautifully done 🌹

[@realdeal7897]

Great annotation ❤

[@mary-anneswanson1428]

That was a lovely video . THANK YOU FOR UPLOADING IT FOR US TO WATCH :) (sorry caplock was on )

[@DrDavidOwens]

Thank you for your nice comment. David

[@johnthornhill8551]

This is a wonderful documentary. I will share it with my course group at York. Thankyou.

[@DrDavidOwens]

Pleased you liked it and hope your group enjoy not too.

[@spgranorthiam123]

Thank You, very well narrated,

[@conniedean9466]

David, thanks for the excellent video! It was very well done.!

[@DrDavidOwens]

Many thanks!

[@tonyburkhart888]

Excellent production!!!

[@nanaof7preciousgrands115]

Very informative and simply peaceful looking cemetery...thank you so much for this video

[@angeloleone9793]

Excellent!

[@ramirosabatini]

Thank you.

[@Beantbeantbeant]

Fantastic, amazingly researched

[@peterneijs387]

bloody brilliant ....

[@andreabraun8235]

just lovvvve stories of the people buried in the HIGH GATE CEMETERY,MAY THEY ALL REST IN PEACE

[@keithmiller322]

Excellent.

[@andreabraun8235]

also just lovvve your channel,thank you for sharing this awesome video

[@DrDavidOwens]

Thank you for your very complimentary comment.

[@andreabraun8235]

@@DrDavidOwens you're very welcome sweetheart,I always appreciate people sharing neat things

[@mygrammieis]

Awesomely beautiful.. thank you for sharing 🙌🏻and very interesting information also...

[@DrDavidOwens]

My pleasure

[@margaretdrew2844]

Thank you so much for this interesting video.

[@samiblank6761]

fantastic upload

[@larry1824]

Excellent on all levels

[@DrDavidOwens]

Thank you for your kind comments. I enjoyed researching and making the documentary, one of many I have made on burial places. David

[@larry1824]

Fascinating especially the Booths

[@puffeiffer]

02:45 Well… NO, actually. They weren’t modeled on Peré-LaChaise. It was the other way around. The documentary of Peré-LaChaise Cemetery makes clear that it started out as a drab, unimaginative cemetery no one wanted to be buried in. It lay sparsely populated for some decades. Until Paris looked to Britain’s long tradition of Neo-Classical gardens and follies to reboot their cemetery’s image. They also dreamed up the gimmick of relocating remains of notables and celebrities from other cemeteries and setting them up with enviable architectural monuments. Pere-LaChaise was around before Highgate. But not as a garden cemetery.

[@DrDavidOwens]

The topic you raise is very interesting and, if you would provide me with references for the source of your information, I would certainly enjoy reviewing them. Your post inspired me to review academic literature on 19th century garden cemeteries. There seems to be agreement that Pere La Chaise in Paris (founded in 1804) was the inspiration for the designers of Kensal Green (founded in 1833) and the other so called ‘Magnificent Seven Cemetries’ in London. Of course, Englsh designers did not make carbon copies of Pere La Chaise; they introduced beautiful novel designs that surely would have influenced the further development of established garden cemeteries in France, United States and elsewhere. . Regards, David

[@puffeiffer]

@@DrDavidOwens As I stated, Peré La Chaise predates Kensal Green but it didn’t start out as a garden style cemetery. No one wanted to be buried there because it was situated in the poorest arrondisement of Paris: the 20th. There were only 13 plots sold for roughly ten years. Until two things happened: The relocation and import of famous people’s remains (Poet Jean de la Fontaine and Moliére the playwright to start) and restructuring the cemetery to be more in line with the English-Garden style, mirroring the English-Style gardens on the estate of Father La Chaise, after whom the cemetery’s named. Brongniart, who designed the cemetery as it looks today, didn’t even get commissioned until 1812 and his plans are famously dated in the year of 1813. Add construction time, and you get that much farther afield of 1804. The cemetery then brought on a resident sculptor to custom-design vaults, mausoleums, and gravestones as part of the burial package. Only then did Parisians give it a second look. This is widely searchable from different historians online.

[@DrDavidOwens]

Thank you for the additional information.

[@andreabraun8235]

i just lovvve history about all over the world and of course cemetaries

[@michael-po1vb]

Hi, you state Brompton stopped burials in 1952, however my Grandmother was buried there in 1970. Regards

[@DrDavidOwens]

Thank you for your comment. Brompton was closed to burials between 1952 and 1996, except for family and Polish interments. In the 21st century it is once again a working cemetery, with plots for interments and a 'Garden of Remembrance' for the deposit of cremated remains.

[@asa1973100]

Magnificent thank you

[@DrDavidOwens]

Thank you too!

[@kelrogers8480]

It's ironic:the rich and famous payed a fortune to be buried here, and yet end up forgotten and derelict.

[@divaden47]

What about the City of London cemetery? It's huge an I have several family members buried there.

[@DrDavidOwens]

Thanks. I will check it out.

[@andreabraun8235]

omg JUST LOVVVE HARRY THORINGTON"S GRAVE,LOVVVE THE PIANO

[@richardhead3211]

great job thumbs up 780 baby!

[@DrDavidOwens]

Thank you for your compliment

[@colinpiper4386]

Excellent video. No awful AI voice too.

[@DrDavidOwens]

Pleased you enjoyed the video.

[@andreabraun8235]

GOD BLESS YOU WILLIAM AND KATHERINE BOOTH,THANK YOU FOR CREATING THE ORGINIZATION, SALVATION ARMY!!! may you both r.i.p

[@sarahescue2175]

OMG, I'd die to get in there

[@andrewgates8158]

Lol

[@Coltnz1]

When London’s cemeteries became full, Brookwood cemetery was created.

[@englishjona6458]

Accidentally contracted syphilis during surgery😂😂😂😂

[@andreabraun8235]

love the moselums Andrew Dukrow designed for his wife,

[@larry1824]

I'm sure Ms Parkhurst knows she won

[@tessmcnamara9230]

I wonder why royals did not bury their loved in Westminster Cathedral or Windsor Castle it is so sad they should have been buried with their parents

[@andreabraun8235]

what a beauuuuutiful name,Alexandrina,how different but very beautiful

[@adrianmarsden6729]

A good documentary in the main and generally good enough to escape a dislike but not good enough to merit a like. The sly suggestions of sexual impropriety would cause a court case today - although, of course, the dead can't speak back. They are easy targets - a lazy bit of work. The comments about mourning attire and its apparent cessation by circa 1900 are just wrong. Lavish and ostentatious mourning continued well into the 20th century. An entertaining taster but more work needed. A Beta or - in today's parlance - about 60%. But keep trying!

[@DrDavidOwens]

Adrian, thank you for your comments. Historians are divided about whether Princess Sophia had an illegitimate son, and there is further debate about the identity of the alleged father: Thomas Garth, her father's equerry or her elder brother the Duke of Cumberland (by rape). Sophia never married and would seem not to have had a happy life before she died in 1848.

[@andreabraun8235]

oh my,sad that Charles Dickens sister in-law,Mary was his mistress,vErrry SHAMEFUL!¡

[@chrisskinner6291]

These morgue places have blood pits so it's as feeding something.

[@Rich-cs9fv]

What for

[@lindageorge8209]

So vicars were resurrectionists... Hmm...

[@chrisskinner6291]

All Roman could be.