The cemetery has been designated a conservation area by Wirral Borough Council, which owns the site.

In the 1840s, Joseph Paxton was approached to design a large municipal cemetery for the expanding township of Birkenhead, but because of a recession and a subsequent decrease in the population, the plan went no further.

A competition was held for the design which was won by Edward Kemp,[2] a pupil of Paxton's and Curator of Birkenhead Park.

Kemp was assisted by Edward Mills, a prominent Birkenhead surveyor from Hamilton Square, and Messrs Lucy and Littler, architects of Liverpool.

[5] Other interments include James Taylor Cochran, who built the Resurgam; Sir William Jackson; Arthur Thomas Doodson; Mary Ann Mercer; Isaac Roberts;[1] and Edmund Knight and Hugh Singleton, both in turn Roman Catholic Bishop of Shrewsbury.