History
Closure
13 September 2026
What happened after closure Closure did not immediately produce the landscape we see today. Horton Cemetery had once been a deliberately landscaped and maintained…
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The History
Horton Cemetery contains burials of mental health and epileptic patients, soldiers, and asylum born children from 1899-1955.
Find below a series of articles describing the various stages in the history of the cemetery itself.
History articles
History
Rapid Growth
13 September 2026
The cemetery had been created for hundreds. It would have to accommodate thousands. As the Epsom Cluster expanded, so did the number of people…
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World War 2
13 September 2026
A generation later, following the Great War, war returned. Horton once again became a war hospital and the Cluster was reshaped to accommodate wartime…
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World War 1
13 September 2026
The First World War dramatically changed the Epsom Cluster. Horton Asylum was converted into a military hospital and tens of thousands of servicemen passed…
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First & Last Burial
13 September 2026
The First Burial The first person known to have been buried at Horton Cemetery was Annie James. She had been a patient at the…
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Early Days
13 September 2026
The story of Horton Cemetery begins not at Horton, but at Epsom’s own cemetery in Ashley Road. Epsom had opened its new municipal cemetery…
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The Cemetery Today
13 September 2026
Today, Horton Cemetery bears little resemblance to the burial ground that once existed here. The chapel has gone. The headstones have gone. Paths and…
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