The young man appears to have come of a high-spirited family; his father, John Gunston, befriended many of the ministers when they fell beneath the arm of persecution; and when the eminent Dr. Manton was imprisoned in the Gate House for refusing the Oxford Oath, the Lady Broughton, his keeper, placing the keys at his disposal, allowed him an opportunity of visiting his friend, Mr. Gunston, at Newington. Thus we have the early and tender connection of Watts with this village. And not long since the old house was standing. An amiable and accomplished man of our time writes, in a letter dated May, 1840: “On my return to town I stopped at Stoke Newington, and paid a promised visit to an old friend and colleague at Abney House, where he has charge of the literary education of some twenty candidates for the ministry. The house—that in which Dr. Watts lived for more than a generation, composed his precious hymns, and at last died—afforded me, in its noble antique apartments, in its still rich embellishments, its surrounding grounds (said to contain the bones of Oliver Cromwell), and, above all, its sacred associations, more delight than I can express.”[39] On the spot where the house stood, with its beautiful grounds, gardens, and trees extending round, is now laid out the Abney Park Cemetery, amongst whose forests of tombs may be detected innumerable names very dear to the memories of modern Nonconformists: since the closing of Bunhill Fields, Abney Park Cemetery has become what it was, a sort of _santa croce_, or _campo santo_ of revered and hallowed dust.