By the mid-19th century Greenock’s cemeteries were filling up as the town grew as a result of the Industrial Revolution. In the 1840s permission was given to use this hundred acre site, to the west of the town, as a burial ground. Over 150 years later it is, itself, now close to being full.
Architecture: Much of the cemetery is Victorian, a period of heavy embellishment. Compare the beautiful polished granite with the cheaper and often rain-damaged sandstone. Read the quotes and symbols and understand what was important to these families. Note the huge differences in design, from the grandiose to the simple.
People: Many of the good and the great are buried here. See Burns’ Highland Mary’s grave next door to James Watt’s family and cairn. Note the view that Robert Wallace, Greenock’s first MP, had of his town. Greenock’s shipbuilders, sugar refiners, engineers and businessmen share space with schoolmasters, stationmasters, clerics and hapless families struck down with the town’s cholera and typhus epidemics. See the priests’ stone, the Jewish enclave, the Working Boys’ Home and the children’s area. Some graves are ostentatious. Many are quiet and secluded.
Beauty: The many beautiful varieties of trees and bushes, coupled with the natural paths and hillocks, make this cemetery one of Britain’s finest. Greenock Cemetery is well maintained and has for decades been used as a stress-lifting walk full of local interest.