Mausoleum, Brook Street Allotments

Frogmore & the Royal Mausoleum are concealed behind the trees to the left in the Home Park. The green copper roof of the Mausoleum is sometimes visible. The house, grounds and Mausoleum are only open to the public on certain days each year. Frogmore House was bought by Queen Charlotte in 1787 and converted into its present Grecian style by James Wyatt in 1794. It was later the home of Queen Victoria’s mother, The Duchess of Kent. A lawn and a lake leads to the Mausoleum built by Queen Victoria for The Duchess of Kent, who died in 1861, a circular temple in granite stone by A.J. Humbert. He went on to build the Royal Mausoleum for Prince Albert, who also died in 1861. Queen Victoria visited it frequently and was buried there in 1901. John Piper and John Betjeman wrote: ‘The Queen’s grief still throbs through its interior as though she had left her sorrow on earth to haunt this rich, forbidding temple to her loneliness.’ Beside the Royal Mausoleum is the Royal Burial Ground where members of the Royal Family have been buried since 1927. Amongst them are The Dukes and Duchesses of Windsor, Gloucester and Kent.