Since Rotherhithe waved farewell to the Mayflower in 1620 this former docklands area has seen more than its fair share of corpses, as the tides of the Thames naturally spew drowned bodies onto its shore. This walk will visit the nineteenth century Old Mortuary that dealt with these washed-up cadavers. It will also reveal the despicable activities of the body-snatchers who dug up freshly-interred corpses to sell to anatomists. The walk will end appropriately at the Watch House, built in 1821 within the graveyard of St Mary’s to limit this illicit nocturnal activity. The subterranean prison that once incarcerated these heartless miscreants now serves coffee and attendees may revive their flagging bodies with a latte in the graveyard.

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Robert Stephenson is a qualified City of London Culture and Heritage guide and a trustee at Kensal Green and Brompton cemeteries. He teaches on London and death studies. Robert is also chairman of the National Federation of Cemetery Friends.