Circular Road Cemetery is a
cemetery located in
Freetown,
Sierra Leone. It was opened in 1827. Urban expansion had meant that the old burial ground at the south end of Howe Street had become surrounded by houses and so could not be enlarged. While the old cemetery was still used for the descendants of Nova Scotia and Maroon settlers, this was subsequently turned into a playground.
History of neglect
The cemetery has a long history of neglect. Writing in 1958,
Christopher Fyfe
Christopher Fyfe (9 November 1920 – 26 August 2008) was a Scottish historian most noted for his work on Sierra Leone in West Africa.
Biography
Christopher Hamilton Fyfe was born in England in 1920 to a family of Scottish ancestry. His father ...
complained that the cemetery was little cared for, mentioning that John Bowen, the bishop of Sierra Leone in the late 1850s had described the place as “a wild, neglected cemetery”.
Lee Karen Stow made similar complaints after visiting the cemetery in 2015.
is responsible for the cemetery's upkeep. However the
Ministry of Lands, Country Planning and the Environment has been issuing documents which legitimise otherwise illegal occupation of parts of the cemetery. In this way the building of first temporary structures and then more permanent buildings has been encroaching on the land. The lack of any fencing has not helped the authorities to discourage this, or the dumping of waste there which is also prevalent.
In October 2016 there were accounts of graves being opened and body parts removed. Although some fences had been erected, they were not sufficient to deter trespassing during the night after cemetery staff had gone home.
Three people were arrested for this, two of whom were released for lack of evidence.
Notable interments
*
Neil Campbell 1827
*
Octavius Temple 1834
*
John Jeremie 1841
*
John Bowen 1859
References
{{coord missing, Sierra Leone
Cemeteries in Africa
Buildings and structures in Freetown