Park of the week

168. St George's Churchyard and Gardens

Yes! We do go south of the river. This garden is in Southwark, and we visited several in the area.

St George’s is a quiet spot, despite being just off busy Borough High Street. There has been a church on the site since the 12th Century, but the  present church of St George the Martyr dates from the 18th. The churchyard closed for burials in 1853 and was converted into a public garden in 1882. When nearby Tabard Street was extended part of the churchyard was lost, and the detached portion was re-opened as public gardens in 1902, now called St George's Garden.

The north boundary wall (shown above left) originally formed the southern boundary of Marshalsea Prison (closed in 1842), where Dickens' father was imprisoned for debt in 1824, and Dickens was aged 12. Dickens, who had to lodge in a house that belonged to the Vestry Clerk of St George’s, used that experience of the Marshalsea as setting for Little Dorrit, and the title character (aka Amy, “the Child of the Marshalsea”) was born in the prison and baptised and married in the church. Her kneeling figure can be seen in the stained-glass east window. He was haunted by the trauma of this period of his childhood for the rest of his life and references to it, and to the abandonment he felt with the sudden loss of his childhood, crop up time and again in his novels.

The garden has been re-landscaped and has a hedged area, gravelled paths and seats. There are mature trees, including a plane tree with seating around the trunk. A number of the original gravestones have been placed in one corner.

While I was taking the air, a man approached, greeted me and inquired after my health. I replied that I did well and hoped that he did too, after which he went on his way. I’d like to say that it was the ghost of Dickens, but I think he was more likely an “early imbiber”. 

Judith Field

St George’s Churchyard and Garden, Long Lane, London SE1 4PG