Does the time machine exist in a London cemetery?

It seems like a story out of a novel, but there is a lot of reality in this story. Brompton Cemetery, one of the oldest in the British capital, is also one of the most beautiful due to the care that has been given to this space that occupies some 16 hectares between Old Brompton and Fulham Roads, in the very heart of London . It is there that the remains of some 205,000 people rest. It was in this place, playing among their tombs and pantheons, where Beatriz Potter found the names for some of the characters who would star in her famous stories. But, in addition to inspiration for children’s stories, Brompton has in one of its central spaces a large pantheon about which little is known and which is the subject of no little speculation.

It is the last resting place of Hannah Courtoy, a woman of whom little is known. His pantheon, six meters high, built in granite and with a heavy bronze door that has remained unopened for 150 years, also houses the remains of two of his three daughters, of whom there is hardly any information, as well as about their mother. . Among what we know is that her name was actually Hannah Peters, she never married and worked as a housekeeper for an elderly businessman named John Courtoy. When she died, Hannah inherited her surname and her massive fortune that made her one of the richest women in London. There are many stories that affirm that she was the lover of some of the most powerful and influential men of her time, whether they were kings or politicians. That claim has never been proven. What is clear is that he had two characters among his friends who would have a very prominent role in the story told here.

One of them was named Joseph Bonomi, famous for being a renowned Egyptologist. He was one of the first to decipher some of the hieroglyphs engraved in the Valley of the Kings, where he went on various expeditions between 1820 and 1830. Also an artist, Bononi had been a museum curator and had a special ability to disseminate his knowledge, among them was what he had learned in Egypt about the possibility of moving through time. That was something that he was convinced had been explained to him in the Egyptian hieroglyphs that he had been able to decode. Hannah was one of Bonomi’s best followers to the point of wanting to fund his research.

But in order to materialize what was studied, a man of technique was needed. That was Captain Samuel Alfred Warner, whom the British Museum today qualifies as a “charlatan.” Warner claimed to have been the inventor of an “invisible projectile” and a “long-range” weapon, the precedents of the torpedo, with the ability to be able to destroy ships on the high seas. The patent claims for this material ended in the House of Lords with the intervention of the Duke of Wellington himself, but without reaching a specific resolution. Today Warner is seen by some as a fraud, but there are those who see him as a military genius ahead of his time.

Our three protagonists rest in Brompton today and it is from here that all the theories about the supposed manufacture of a time machine have started. Hannah Courtoy’s mausoleum, six meters high and with some Egyptian hieroglyphs, undoubtedly the influence of Bononi. The cemetery preserves the plans of all the graves … except this one. There is no evidence of the design of this work in which the collaboration of Bonomi and Warner is confirmed. Nor can it be accessed inside. For several years the key that should open the heavy bronze door has been lost and, despite the good intentions of those responsible for Brompton, no locksmith has been able to work the miracle.

The mausoleum was completed in 1853, five years after Hannah’s death. Warner soon died in strange circumstances after the play. There is a rumor that the death was a consequence of what was discovered while designing the project. There are also those who believe that Bonomi murdered him so that they do not speak to anyone about that job. There are other mausoleums in seven London cemeteries with this form of temple and the same size, as well as one in the Parisian Montmartre cemetery with similar characteristics and with Egyptian hieroglyphs that symbolize the belief in the afterlife.

The mystery is prolonged by learning that the tomb of Bonomi has a jackal engraved on an Egyptian temple. The animal looks towards the mausoleum of its friend.

There is another hypothesis and it can be quite convincing: that Bonomi and Warner scammed poor Hannah Courtoy to make part of their fortune with the supposed time machine. What is clear is that they have not returned from the past to tell about it, like their client.

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