FORGOTTEN MANCHESTER: The city’s hidden burial sites

It’s no secret that below the surface of the hustle and bustle of Manchester, there lurks a number of ancient burial sites.

Over the years, dozens of cemeteries were built across the city, with thousands upon thousands of bodies being buried, either in grand ceremonies or in archaic public graves. 

And while Manchester has been gradually built and developed above these cemeteries, their legacy remains way below the surface, unbeknown to the vast majority of the public. 

Here’s some of the most prolific burial sites the city has hidden beneath its surface…

St. Augustine’s Catholic Burial Ground, 1820 – 1854

Manchester Archives

While the St. Augustine’s Catholic Burial Ground was demolished over a hundred years ago, its remains continue to lurk beneath a part of Manchester University’s campus on Granby Row.

The burial ground at St Augustine’s officially opened in 1820 and was situated on Granby Row so that access could also be gained via pump Street. However, just a few years after its opening, the site attracted unwanted criminal activity, with William Harrison and William Johnson breaking in and stealing a body from one of the freshly interred graves in 1824.

In 1854, the burial ground became too full’and was considered a risk to human health, resulting in it permanently closing – that same year, excavations for a new schoolrooms took place, resulting in diggers accidentally spearing a buried body with their spades. 

The church of St Augustine’s remained in use until 1908 and a year later the church and the burial ground were sold to the Manchester Corporation. 

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Ardwick Cemetery, 1838 – 1950

Where the Nichols Community Football Centre now stands was the eerie Ardwick Cemetery, located just off of Hyde Road. 

The cemetery was first opened on March 11th 1838, with its first body being that of seventy-eight-year old Johanna Naylor. She was buried in public grave 1286 which, over the next eighteen months, another seventy-five coffins would join her.

By the end of the century, Ardwick Cemetery became the final resting place for some of the towns most influential and notable residents, including the chemist and physicist John Dalton, who apparently had one of the ‘grandest funerals’ the town had witnessed.

In 1950, the Ardwick Cemetery was officially closed for further burials, with an estimated 80,000 people having been interred over the years. Today, all that remains of the cemetery is the former stone gate posts that still mark the entrance of the football centre.

The New Burial Ground, 1789 – 1815

David Dixon / Geograph

Unbeknown to many of the Green Quarter’s residents, the popular Angel Meadow park sits upon an ancient cemetery known as the All Saints Burial Ground.

The cemetery first opened for burials on July 24th 1789 and is believed to have been made up of public graves – graves that would have contained several coffins of people that could not afford their own grave.

All Saints Burial Ground was deemed as full by 1815, with an estimated 30,000 – 40,000 bodies being buried there at one time. During the 1860s, the land was flattened and covered in flagstones, with it later being re-named St. Michael’s flags. 

And in the 1890s, the site and its many bodies was grassed over and converted into a public park, which it remains as to this very day. 

All Saints Burial Ground, 1820 – 1881

Manchester Archives

All Saints Park, just down Oxford Road past the Palace Theatre, sits upon the old All Saints Burial Ground, which welcomed its first body on April 19th 1820.

This burial site was one of the busiest in Manchester, with the number of bodies admitted becoming a real concern to the local residents. According to the archives, locals were worried that waste matter from the freshly buried corpses was seeping into the water supply and contaminating those living in the town… Makes your own worries seem insignificant, doesn’t it?

In 1856, the cemetery was partly closed under direction of the new Burial Acts, meaning no new graves were allowed to be dug. However, this closure did not satisfy the local residents, who complained to the Manchester Guardian that graves were remaining open for weeks, thus damaging the health of those that lived in the area.

Eventually, the grounds were sold to the council and in 1935, the All Saints playground officially opened. After the Blitz, it was transformed into the park it is today.

New Jerusalem Church, 1793 – 1854

Google Maps

Down what is now one of the more elusive ends of Manchester’s city centre once stood the New Jerusalem Church, which housed a seizable cemetery.

The burial ground ran along the side of the Church and, while it is unclear exactly how many burials were there, in 1854 it was closed and the Peter Street School was built on top of the land – now that’s what you call a haunted school.

In 1901 the building was obtained by the Manchester Corporation and the building was demolished. The Corporation then began an excavation process began to remove some of the bodies that still lay under the school.

After this process has finished the Methodist Mission built a new building called the Albert Hall, which still stands today.

Walkers Croft Burial Ground, 1815 – 1848

Google Maps

Hidden beneath the hustle and bustle of Manchester’s Victoria Train Station was once the Walkers Croft Burial Ground, an area notorious for body snatchers.

The first burial took place in 1815, with it being primarily reserved for pauper and public grave burials. However, much like other burial sites of its time, during the 1820s Walkers Croft Burial Ground came under attack from body snatchers, who were operating across a number graveyards across the town.

The burial site became the centre of a public scandal a decade later when a young cholera victim named John Brogan arrived for burial without his head, which had sickeningly been replaced with a brick.

The final burial at the site took place in 1848 and ground was sold to make way for the railway. Many of the bodies remained, with remains been found as recently as 2010.

Rusholme Road Cemetery, 1821 – 1954

Gerald England / Flickr

The Dissenters’ cemetery on Rusholme Road opened on May 16th 1821, and proved to be extremely popular amongst Manchester’s middle and upper classes, attracting some high-profile burials such as that of John Edward Taylor, the founder of the Manchester Guardian.

However, in 1837 the cemetery came under strain thanks to the severe influenza outbreak, which affected nearly every family in the town. On the worst day of the influenza outbreak, the number of burials in the cemetery reportedly reached thirty-six.

In 1954, the cemetery came under control of the Manchester Corporation, who informed relatives of the deceased that if they did not claim any of their memorials or headstones, the bodies would be removed and disposed of. As you can see, the 1950s were a grim time to be alive.

However, the bodies of those buried at the Rusholme Road Cemetery – which is estimated to be over 66,000 – remain peacefully undisturbed under the park.