Busbridge War Memorial Cross

Description

If there was to be any place where it was natural for Lutyens to design a war memorial it would have to be in the Surrey village of Busbridge, the home of the celebrated garden designer Gertrude Jekyll, with whom he collaborated on a series of noted house and garden designs (see “Gardens of a Golden Afternoon” by Jane Brown).

Lutyens’s design is a minimalist tapered cross of Portland stone with an exceptionally thin cross section which he was to use in a number of variations elsewhere in the country. It stands on a coved base which is a typical Lutyens design feature that also appeared on a number of the tombs that he designed.

The churchyard that contains the war memorial also contains three graves designed by Lutyens. Jekyll herself rests in an enclosure filled with her favourite bergenias together with her brother and sister-in-law, whilst alongside are the graves of her mother Julia and Francis McLaren.

Unveiled on 23 July 1922 by General Sir Charles Munro, 1st Baronet of Bearcrofts, GCB, GCSI, GCMG. (Contributor: Tim Skelton)

War Cross on coved base and three square steps. Unveiled by General Sir Charles Munro Bart. on 23 July 1922. The churchyard contains three graves designed by Lutyens – Gertrude Jekyll (together with her brother and sister-in-law), Julia Jekyll (her mother) and Francis McLaren (see Spalding war memorial) and Julia Jekyll. Lutyens also designed the chancel screen inside the Church. (Skelton, 2008, Appendix 1)

In the churchyard a WAR MEMORIAL CROSS by Lutyens, 1922, one of his standard designs, slim and elegant chamfered shaft, with the same over-developed sense of volumetric relations as his Cenotaph in Whitehall. (O’Brien et al., 2022, p.162)

Bibliography

Gliddon, G. and Skelton, T.J. (2008) Lutyens and the Great War. London: Frances Lincoln.

O’Brien, C., Nairn, I. and Cherry, B. (2022) Surrey. Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England. New Haven: Yale University Press.

Also Cited In

Nairn, I., Pevsner, N. (1971) Surrey (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England). 2nd edn. Yale University Press.

Listing Grade

II*

Listing Reference

1044531

Client