Hanley Cemetery, Stoke-on-Trent is the oldest cemetery in the Potteries. Many famous and now unknown potters were buried in this graveyard. My Great, Great, Great Grandfather was Samuel Bevington, who made enough money to buy an indestructible grave and is featured.

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The Staffordshire Advertiser covered the opening on a glorious May Day in 1860 reporting that a 2000-strong crowd cheered Mayor Ridgway and the Bishop of Lichfield’s arrival at the new, Regency-styled, Cemetery Road where the consecration of the chapels was made. Twin Chapels welcome the visitor, made of pink sandstone with plain tiled roofs, with ridge and banded with scalloped tiles.
Henry Ward and Son were responsible for the design of the chapels as well as the sextons and registrars' lodges. In common with other cemeteries in Stoke-on-Trent (such as Hartshill cemetery) there were two chapels. One for the Church of England ( Episcopal ) and one for Dissenters (such as Methodists ).
Each chapel has a vestry and the two buildings are connected by three open archways. The center was grained and for a carriageway; the two side arches being for foot passengers. The chapels were built in a symmetrical manner and the tower, surmounted by a spirelet, rises from the centre. Minton & Co.'s encaustic tiles paved the floor.

One of the oldest remaining graves is that of Master Potter, Samuel Bevington (1808-1863).

Samuel Bevington was born in Shelton, Staffordshire on 1 May 1808 to parents Richard Bevington, Snr (1785-1842) and Hannah Glass (1786-unknown). He was the first Bevington to enter the pottery trade.
In 1825, he was apprenticed to Mr Henry Daniel and Mr Josiah Spode earning 1 shilling per week in year 1, rising to 1s 6d per week in year 2 then 2s 6d per week in year 3, rising to 6s per week in year 7.
H and R Daniel was based on site at Josiah Spode's works in Stoke-on-Trent where they were contracted to carry out the colour making and enamelling for Spode. In 1822, the father and son business set up their own manufactory.

Aged 17, he married Eliza Barlow from Wolstanton, Staffordshire, on 2 April 1826 in Stoke upon Trent. Their first child, Richard, was born in the first month of their marriage.

Over the next 19 years, they had 9 children who all worked in the pottery trade. 4 sons Ambrose, John, James and Thomas all went on to own their own manufactories, employing about 660 staff in 1881. Taken together in 1880, for over a decade, the scale of their businesses was comparable with some of the largest of potters, like Wedgwood.

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