Larger and grander than any other monument, the Beer mausoleum stands at a focal point overlooking the Lebanon Circle. It is a monumental structure with rusticated quoins, thermal windows and a stepped pyramidal roof. The bronze doors were made by Messrs Farmer and Brindley, and the statuary is by Hugh H Armstead, who also worked on the Albert Memorial. Inside there are three sarcophagi and, on the wall a bas-relief showing Beer's daughter, Ada Sophia, being carried up to heaven by an angel. The dome is clad with gold mosaic by Salviati and the walls are lined with ceramic tiles.
John Oldrid Scott
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Grade II* (England and Wales)
1876
The mausoleum of the family of the newspaper magnate Julius Beer (1836-80). Born in Frankfurt, he made a fortune on the London Stock Exchange and became proprietor of The Observer and The Sunday Times. He paid £800 for the site, and £5,000 for the design and erection of the mausoleum. Also interred here are his wife Thyrza (d.1881), daughter Ada Sophia (who died of consumption at the age of six), son Frederick (d.1903) and his brother Arnold (d.1881). The mausoleum was restored in 1993.
Good (November, 2002).
BoE: London 4 (1998) 354;
C Brooks, Mortal Remains (1989) 150-151;
Judi Culbertson & Tom Randall: Permanent Londoners (1991, reprinted 2000) 206;
J S Curl: The Victorian Celebration of Death (2000) 89;
John Gay & Felix Barker: Highgate Cemetery: Victorian Valhalla (1984), 32-34;
H Meller, London Cemeteries: an Illustrated Guide and Gazetteer (1985) 38, 150;
Jean Pateman: In Highgate Cemetery (Friends of Highgate Cemetery, 1992);
The Builder, 18 May 1878, 512-3.
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Highgate West Cemetery
Swain's Lane
London
N6 6PJ