a lunatic asylum, the LNC struggled to sell the remainder. By the time the ten-year window for land sales expired in 1865, only had been sold. With the majority of the surplus lands still unsold, as the ten-year window expired the LNC successfully petitioned for a further five-year extension. The LNC was by this time in serious financial difficulties, and dependent on loans from its own directors to settle outstanding debts. The business had been established on the basis that the cemetery would handle between 10,000 and 50,000 burials per year, but the number never exceeded 4,100 and over its first 20 years of operations averaged just 3,200. As the five-year extension expired the financial difficulties remained, and under pressure from shareholders the London Necropolis & National Mausoleum Amendment Act 1869 was passed. This removed all restrictions on land sales, other than within the existing cemetery and the adjacent reserve site. Despite the releasing of restrictions in the 1869 Act, land sales remained disappointing. By 1887 less than half the surplus land had been sold, much of it at very low prices. Cremation In 1878 the Cremation Society of Great Britain bought an isolated piece of the LNC's Brookwood land and built Woking Crematorium on the site. The crematorium was completed in 1879 but Richard Cross, the Home Secretary, bowed to strong protests from local residents and threatened to prosecute if any cremations were conducted. As a consequence the crematorium was not used other than for the experimental incineration of livestock. The 1884 trial of William Price established that human cremation was not unlawful in England, and on 26 March 1885 the first human cremation took place at Woking. Although the LNC was hostile to the idea of cremation, Woking Crematorium was the only operational crematorium in the country. Since the Necropolis Railway provided the easiest way to transport bodies and mourners from London to the Woking area, transport to and from Woking Crematorium soon began to provide a significant source of revenue for the LNC. Cremation remained unusual and very expensive; the cost of a cremation at Woking was £6, not including transport and funeral costs, more than twice the £2 10s cost of a first class burial at Brookwood. By 1891 only 177 people had been cremated at Woking. Cyril Tubbs recognised that a potential increase in cremations once the practice became accepted represented an opportunity for the