Maintenance work is limiting access at the historic East London Cemetery for up to three weeks during November.

The work at the burial grounds in Grange Road, Plaistow, is along the drive by the main chapel.

“This work is crucial,” the cemetery’s Dominic Scotland said. “It is to make sure the cemetery remains a peaceful environment.”  

The 33-acre site next to the Greenway has two 19th-century Gothic chapels, a CofE burial chapel and a non-denominational chapel for cremations. Burials include 376 casualties of the two world wars.

There are memorials to those who fell in the First World War and to civilians killed in two disasters in east London.

The first disaster memorial commemorates 39 spectators who drowned when a staging collapsed during the launch of HMS Albion on the Thames at Blackwall on the Isle of Dogs in 1898. The second commemorates the 1917 Silvertown explosion at the Brunner Mond chemical and TNT plant, killing 73 people.

Visitors can contact the cemetery about access on 020 7476 5109.