 When the cemetery opened in 1873, it was named "Lee Cemetery", although Lee's church and centre are about 1.5 miles (2.5 km) to the north of the cemetery, the land was covered by the Lee civil Parish at the time.The original cemetery occupied what is now the northernmost part of the cemetery, located on a road named Hither Green Lane, but was renamed Verndant Lane later.The cemetery expanded into a much larger southward, into lands previously occupied by the fields of a farm named "Shroefield Farm".