Undercliffe Cemetery Conservation Area

In the early 1800s, Bradford's textile industry underwent rapid growth and with it Bradford's population, consequently there was pressure on housing then on burial ground space and this eventually became a health hazard. Partly in response to this situation the 'Bradford Cemetery Company' was set up and provisionally registered in 1849. Membership of the company included local notables Henry Brown, Robert Milligan, William Rand, Edward Ripley and Titus Salt. The land used for the cemetery had previously been agricultural land with a farmhouse on part of the Undercliffe Estate of the Hustler family. The plot was purchased in 1851 by John Horsfall and architect John Dale for the sum of…

The cemetery is at a height of 210 m above sea level with an area of 26 acres (10 hectares) accommodating some 124,000 burials and about 23,000 marked graves. Communal graves known as 'company plots' are to be found on the southern side of the site where up to thirty coffins at a time were interred in one grave.

After the opening of Undercliffe cemetery several surrounding properties were built on a speculative basis; a row of houses on Undercliffe Lane known as Guy's Cliffe and properties on Undercliffe Old Road named Westfield Crescent and West View—all these properties now constitute the Undercliffe Cemetery Conservation Area (1984), one of nearly 60 such areas in Bradford.