Key Hill Cemetery

's Hockley Goods depot at bottom right The cemetery was originally laid out for the Birmingham General Cemetery Company by local architect Charles Edge (d.1867). It opened on 23 May 1836. Many of its fittings and memorials are of architectural and artistic merit. The railings and entrance gates with imposing piers (all by Edge) are Grade II listed. The Greek Doric chapel, also by Edge, has been demolished. The cemetery is itself listed Grade II* on the Register of Parks and Gardens of Special Historic Interest. A campaign group, the Friends of Key Hill & Warstone Lane Cemeteries, lobbies to have the cemetery restored. The entrance piers and gates on both Icknield Street and Key Hill have been restored in recent years. ==Burials==

A comprehensive record of memorial inscriptions of existing memorials (and of some of those removed by Birmingham City Council) may be consulted through the Jewellery Quarter Research Trust's website. Notable people buried in the cemetery include: • Marie Bethell Beauclerc (1845–1897): first female reporter (i.e. Pitman shorthand recorder) in England; pioneer in teaching of shorthand and typing in Birmingham; first female teacher in an English boys' public school (Rugby). Plot 961.I. • Alfred Bird (1811–1878): chemist and inventor of egg-free custard and baking powder. Plot 164.H. • John Henry Chamberlain (1831–1883): architect. Plot 701.K. • Samuel Timmins (1826–1902): Shakespearean scholar and antiquarian. Plot 712.K. • Charles Vince (1823–1874): Baptist minister and reformer. Plot 784.K. • John Skirrow Wright (1822–1880): reformer and MP. Plot 218.E. • Edwin Yates (–1874): Mayor of Birmingham 1865. Plot 426.K. ==War graves==

There are 46 Commonwealth service war graves in the cemetery, commemorated by the Commonwealth War Graves Commission, 38 from the First World War (mostly in section L, none marked by headstones) whose names are listed on a Screen Wall memorial; and eight from the Second. ==References==