Exterior of Mausoleum

Yesterday I showed the inside of the Salt Family Mausoleum attached to Saltaire URC. Today's photo shows the outside. You can see how it's tacked onto the church as an afterthought. The church was completed in 1859 but Sir Titus must have had second thoughts and had the Mausoleum added in 1861.

He had already lost two of his children, Whitlam and Mary, by then. Whitlam died of measles aged 4 and Mary died only five weeks later, aged 2, of 'congestion of the brain' (would that be meningitis?). They were initially buried in Lightcliffe, where the family were at that time living. By 1860, the Salts were living at Methley Hall in Leeds and Fanny was seriously ill. It was at that point that Sir Titus must have resolved to have the Mausoleum built, perhaps feeling that he did not want his children buried in different locations. In fact Fanny died before the vault was completed and was laid in a temporary vault in Saltaire church until the Mausoleum was finished. The other two children's bodies were exhumed and moved to Saltaire.

The remains of Sir Titus himself, his wife Lady Caroline, his son Edward's first wife Mary Jane, Titus Jnr and the cremated remains of Catherine, widow of Titus Jnr were all later laid to rest in the Mausoleum.