The graveyard on the golf course

On the Surrey National Golf Course in Caterham, a little south of Croydon, there is an unusual feature: the somewhat overgrown burial ground from St Lawrence's Hospital. While Caterham-on-the-Hill is mostly housing now, until the 1990s it was home to military barracks and a large mental hospital, which was formerly an asylum. The patients were those which we would today consider to have learning disabilities. 

I had read that the burial ground had been located on the golf course but I wasn't sure how accessible it would be. I took a 466 bus to the Tesco at Caterham-on-the-Hill and walked through a residential estate for about 10 minutes until I reached the end of Drake Avenue, where it meets Fairbourne Lane. There I found the entrance to the public bridleway which crosses the golf course. After walking along a track with high hedges both sides, I found a gate on my right, with a sign on it informing me it was St Lawrence's Burial Ground, inviting me to "enjoy the peace and natural beauty... at [my] own risk".

There is also an interpretation board with detailed information and pictures relating to the former hospital. The board states that the burial ground was used for a period of 50 years, from 1915 to 1965. It listed the names on the headstones which had so far been found. While the sign states that over 3,100 people were buried here, only sixteen headstones have been preserved. Of these, a number were for children and teenagers, the youngest being just six years old when he died. 

There is a network of paths through the site, some open and others through areas of woodland where fallen trees can make progress tricky. It's atmospheric but not in the way you might expect a burial ground to be. It has the feel of a place that has been abandoned to nature, although in recent years there have been efforts to manage the site for both nature and human visitors, through cutting the grass, nettles and brambles back carefully. It's easy to forget that you're in the middle of a manicured, popular golf course, until you hear the thwack of a club hitting a ball and voices talking. 

Fallen trees with the golf course club house in the distance

Sadly there isn't much information available about the people who were buried here. There's something particularly poignant about the two damaged angel statues in the photo below. One of the statues was dedicated to Joseph H Wenderott, who died aged just 15 in 1942. Records on Ancestry.co.uk suggest he was from the Poplar area of London but I couldn't find any information about when he was admitted to Caterham or why. During WWII some of the beds were used for air raid victims but much of the hospital was still used for people with learning disabilities and mental health problems. 

Headstone of Joseph H Wenderott

The reason I'm writing about this place is that I believe it deserves a much higher profile and more visitors. We've moved on from the attitudes where people with mental health problems or learning disabilities were just locked away and largely forgotten about. Yet this site and many others serve as reminders of the many thousands who lived and died in these institutions. 

Some parts of the site are densely wooded

Grassland and tall black pine trees

Brown argus butterfly, I'm pretty sure it is anyway

Gatekeeper butterfly - there were loads of these around

I think this is a beefly of some sort

Damselfly. There are ponds on the golf course.

The bridleway continues the other side of the burial ground past the golf clubhouse to Leazes Avenue and from there it's a short walk to the historic Chaldon Church; from there you can walk to Farthing Downs. Alternatively, the Bridlepath off Leazes Avenue leads through some woodland to Happy Valley and Coulsdon Common. I recommend the Ordnance Survey map phone app, which has an annual subscription charge but shows all the public rights of way and your current location. It's invaluable for exploring once outside of urban areas and discovering the often poorly signposted paths that allow access across otherwise private land like golf courses. 

Looking back towards the burial ground from the bridleway to Leazes Avenue

For more information on the former hospital the Workhouses history website has a detailed account. 

Precise location on Google Maps.