The English Cemetery, Il Cimitero degli Inglesi, or more correctly, Il Cimitero acattolico di Santa Maria delle Fede, is located near Piazza Garibaldi, Naples, Italy. It was the final resting place of many Swiss, Germans, Americans, Irish, Scottish and English who lived in Naples, were passing through on the Grand Tour, or were merchants or seamen.
History
The cemetery was the burial place of the (mainly foreign) Protestants who died in Naples, although people of other religions ended up here as well. It was a unique memorial to the foreigners who formed part of the commercial elite of Naples at that time.
The cemetery was closed for burials in 1893 and its maintenance given over to the British consulate. Over the following half-century what was once a romantic memory of the bourgeoisie of 18th-century Naples was scandalously allowed to fall into disrepair. Statues were vandalized and stolen and the entire cemetery became overgrown with weeds and vegetation. At the end of the 1950s the cemetery was donated to the Comune of Naples and a plan was drawn up for the re-utilization of the area. This foresaw the conversion of the cemetery into a public park, retaining some of the memorials as a reminder of the history of the cemetery and those interred in it. However, while most of the remaining land area of the cemetery was retained, only a fraction of the memorials were renovated and preserved, and the original ambience was almost obliterated in the construction of the public park.
Since its re-opening as a park in the early 1990s, some of the remaining memorials have been vandalized.
Burials and inscriptions
In 1980 the land was returned by the British Consulate to the comune of Naples, and was made into a park. Almost all the graves were moved to the Cemetery of Poggioreale. However, records remain of those who were buried here in the 19th century, along with some inscriptions.
Notable burials
Mary Somerville (née Fairfax), Scottish mathematician and theoretical astronomer
Dionysius Lardner Irish scientific writer
Anton Sminck van Pitloo (1790–1837), Dutch painter
William Gell (1777–1836), English archaeologist, traveller and writer
Keppel Richard Craven (1779–1851), English traveller and dilettante
Elizabeth Craven, Princess Berkeley and Margravine of Brandenburg-Ansbach (1750–1828), English socialite, playwright and travel writer Friedrich Dehnhardt, German botanist
Among others buried here were seven members of the crew of HMS Hannibal, which was used to transport Garibaldi's soldiers. The ship arrived in Naples in July 1860. In November a smallpox epidemic broke out, and in ten days the British admiral reported that ninety men had caught the disease, including himself. A memorial was erected by the crew of HMS Hannibal in memory of their shipmates.