Ray family mausoleum
| Browse information by: Location Makers General Information Classification Object Parts Object Condition History References Photographs |  Author: Anthony McIntosh Copyright for Photograph: Creative Commons |
Location
| Street: | Lewes Road |
| Town: | Brighton |
| Parish: | Brighton |
| Council: | Brighton & Hove City Council |
| County: | East Sussex |
| Postcode: | BN2 |
| Location on Google Map | |
| Object setting: | Garden |
| and in: | Religious |
| Access is: | Public |
| Location note: | Extra-Mural Cemetery, next to the Cemetery Chapel, north side of cemetery |
| In the AZ book: | East Sussex |
| Page: | 132 |
| Grid reference: | D5 |
| The A-Z books used are A-Z East Sussex and A-Z West Sussex (Editions 1A 2005). Geographers' A-Z Map Company Ltd. Sevenoaks. | |
| OS Reference: | TQ3205 |
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Makers
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General Information
| Commissioned by: | Ray family |
| Construction period: | c1850 |
| Installation date: | 1850 |
| Work is: | Extant |
| Owner custodian: | Ray family |
| Object listing: | Grade II: of special interest warranting every effort to preserve them |
| Description: | Mausoleum of the Ray family. Knapped flint with granite dressings, asphalted roof. The building is square in plan and partly set into the hillside. Pointed-arched entrance to the west set under a rectangular hoodmould, the spandrels filled with quatrefoils, and over it a gabled niche containing a Classical female figure. The two principal fronts to west and south are divided by buttresses creating uneven bays on the west side, even bays on the south, and there is a high base with an offset through which the entrance breaks. The south bay to the west has a trefoiled niche under a pointed-arched hoodmould with another Classical female figure in it and a cross in an octofoil above. On the south side there are two trefoiled panels under ogee hoodmoulds, with sculptural reliefs of 'Mary at the Sepulchre' to the west, and to the east 'Gethsemane'. The east face has a similar panel of Christ and St Peter. |
| Inscription: | “Keep innocency and take heed unto the thing that is right: for that shall bring a man peace at the last.” |
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Classification
| Categories: | Funerary, Free Standing, Commemorative, Architectural, Religious, Sculptural |
| Object type1: | Sculpture |
| Object type2: | Relief |
| Object type3: | Building |
| Object subtype1: | Mausoleum |
| Subject type1: | Allegorical |
| Subject subtype1: | Group |
| Subject type2: | Figurative |
| Subject subtype1: | Group |
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Object Parts
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Object Condition
| Date of on-site inspection: | 01/05/2008 |
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History
| History: | ‘Bishop’s “Strolls in the Brighton Extra Mural Cemetery” says that it was built for a barrister of that name. But the oldest interment in it was that of Lucy Langford Ray in 1856. No male member of the Ray family was buried there until Robert Ray in 1871... The interior is fitted with shelves to take 42 coffins, but only 14 burials have taken place there.’
(Brighton Cemeteries) The Extra-Mural Cemetery covers land formerly the open arable field of Scabe's Castle, a late-eighteenth-century farm with buildings in Hartington Road. These were demolished in the 1900s when Hartington Place and Hartington Terrace were developed. The Extra-Mural cemetery is the oldest of the three cemeteries on the land. It was originally a private burial ground, laid out on 28 acres in 1850 by the Brighton Extra-Mural Company, 6 acres being the gift of the Marquess of Bristol. The entrance was a castellated gateway with a round tower in Lewes Road, and there were two mortuary chapels designed by A.H.Wilds of which only the Anglican chapel remains. The cemetery was a favourite resort in the nineteenth century and even had a guide book published, but in 1956 the now redundant cemetery was purchased by the corporation and restored as an interesting and picturesque garden of remembrance which contains many impressive Victorian tombs, including those of several important figures in Brighton's history. In the driveway is the borough mortuary which opened in August 1962 and has between 600 and 700 admissions a year. (Encyclopaedia of Brighton by Tim Carder). The cemetery was consecrated on 14 November 1857 by the then Bishop of Chichester, Dr. A.T. Gilbert |
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References
| Source 1 : | |
| Title: | 'Brighton Cemeteries' |
| Type: | Book |
| Author: | Dale, Antony. |
| Edition: | 1995 Reprint |
| Page: | 13 |
| Publisher: | Brighton Borough Council. Brighton. |
| Source 2 : | |
| Title: | 'Encyclopaedia OF Brighton' |
| Type: | Book |
| Author: | Carder, Timothy |
| Publisher: | East Sussex County Libraries. Lewes. |
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Photographs
Author: Anthony McIntosh Copyright: Creative Commons |  Author: Anthony McIntosh Copyright: Creative Commons |
 Author: Anthony McIntosh Copyright: Creative Commons |  Author: Anthony McIntosh Copyright: Creative Commons |
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