The Church of St Mary Magdalene was constructed in 1160 and the extinct vicarage building was first mentioned in charters dating to 1154–1169. The vicarage was depicted in the 1790 Attenburrow map within the centre of the Site. The churchyard became overcrowded by the end of the 18th century which led to the vicarage being demolished and its land incorporated into the graveyard. By 1856 the cemetery was again at capacity and its use ceased. In the majority of the Site, within both the original churchyard and the area of the vicarage and later graveyard, a thick reddish-brown loam representing cemetery disturbed soil,was present. The layer was encountered at a depth between 0.2m–0.5m BGL and contained 226 fragments of disarticulated human bone. The fragmentary nature of the assemblage indicated that the remains were not in-situ and that had been disturbed following their deposition. Although layer was inconsistent in composition, indicating that it had been disturbed multiple times, no difference between the deposit in the original churchyard area and the later graveyard was detected. The concentrations of bone were generally found within the areas of the Site associated with the original churchyard and have the potential to date from the medieval period to the 19th century. No remains associated with the vicarage buildings were identified within the cable trench which ran at a depth of 0.5 BGL across the area where the vicarage is depicted. The remaining features were cut into or were covered by the graveyard soil. These consisted of two brick walls within the original churchyard area and a pit with dumped material. The presence of a gravestone in the interface between the topsoil and the cemetery soil, indicates that the upper horizon of the cemetery soil represents the depth of truncation during the levelling of the Site for the gardens and the removal of the headstones. (1)

The churchyard was first described in a charter of Henry II in the mid-12th century. The charter refers to the vicarage and churchyard as the ‘house with the land on the northeast of the Mother Church of Newark’ and later charters make it clear that the vicarage lay to the north of the churchyard. The northern boundary of the original churchyard - today the Garden of Rest - roughly demarcates the northern extent of the medieval town; the road known as The Mount is assumed to mark the line of the ditch which ran alongside the old medieval ramparts. Historically, the vicarage lay between the Mount and the churchyard as recorded on the 1790 map of Newark. By the 17th and 18th centuries not only was the churchyard being encroached upon by market stalls and animal pens (Mr Christopher Haslam, John Middlebrooke and Anthony Hobman were all cited for ‘takinge the churchyard in to his owne us[e]’ in 1627), but it was also becoming overcrowded for burials. The 1773 Act of Parliament which allowed for the sale of property to fund the building of the Town Hall also enabled the enlargement of the churchyard. By 1818 the decision was also made to demolish the vicarage and to extend the churchyard as far as The Mount; 10 Appleton Gate was purchased for the use of the vicar. Despite these extensions, by the middle of the 19th century the churchyard had reached capacity and was closed to burials in 1856. By the early 20th century the north churchyard had become a space for public use. The opening of the churchyard to the public realised the desire of then vicar Rev. W. P. Hindley that it should serve a purpose for residents in the middle of the town, which the ducal meadow and the distant Sconce Hill and the Castle Gardens cannot do. The War Memorial Garden was created in 1919 dedicated to those who lost their lives in the First World War. The memorial cross was designed by Sir Reginald Blomfield. During the 1950s the headstones were removed from the old churchyard and placed along the edges, the space was cleared to provide ordered paths and flower beds, after which time this area was formally known as the Garden of Rest. (2)

<1> Eleri Davies, 2025, Remembrance Garden, St Mary Magdalene Church, Newark-on-Trent: Report on Archaeological Monitoring and Recording (Unpublished document). SNT5938.

<2> Historic England, 2024, Newark on Trent, Historic Area Assessment by Historic England (Unpublished document). SNT6029.