USA > Connecticut > New Haven County > Waterbury > The town and city of Waterbury, Connecticut, from the aboriginal period to the year eighteen hundred and ninety-five, Volume I > Part 72
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* In April, 1805, Joseph Payne's coffin was brought to this cemetery, on neighbors' shoulders from Columbia (now Prospect), for burial beside his kindred. A violent thunder-shower came up as they neared a large barn standing on present Dublin street, the only shelter within reach, and all took refuge in it until the shower had passed over.
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The land occupied by the Roman Catholics for their earliest cemetery lay south of the south fence of the Grand street burying yard, and was purchased from J. M. L. Scovill in 1847. Entrance to it was gained by a road from Grand street through the older bury- ing ground (see Volume II, page 732).
On April 26, 1882, the legislature by special act authorized and empowered the town of Waterbury by the majority of its selectmen to convey its interest in the old Grand street cemetery to the city of Waterbury. The act, while providing for the purchase of indi- vidual interests in the old burial grounds, directed as follows:
The city shall make arrangements for suitable places in other cemeteries to which the remains and monuments remaining in said old burial grounds may be removed, in all cases where the friends of those buried in the old burial grounds do not provide for the same. Upon the passage of the final decree and the payment to the parties of the respective sums, and [let this be noted] the removal of the remaining bodies and monuments from the old burial grounds, said old burial grounds shall be used as a public park by the city of Waterbury, or the same may be used for any suitable public building or other public purpose.
This act was ratified by a vote of the city in May, 1890. During the next few months, the only persons who publicly protested against this proposed action, so far as known to the writer, were Sarah J. Prichard, Mrs. Lucy Bronson Dudley of New York, and Mrs. Gilbert Hotchkiss; but the advocates for the erection of the Bronson Library upon the site in question were many. Miss Prich- ard made the following "appeal " for the preservation of the ancient burying yard of Waterbury in the American of August 28:
At a date and in a manner to us unknown, but at a period very early in the history of this town, there was set apart on the hill known to the founders of Water- bury as Burying Yard hill, a certain parcel of land for use as a place of burial, wherein for the space of an entire generation all the dead, so far as is known, of the plantation of Mattatuck and town of Waterbury were laid.
On Friday, March 27, 1801, Joseph Hopkins died at New Haven while in attend- ance as senior assistant judge of the county court. Three days after the death of Mr. Hopkins, who had been buried outside the limits of the ancient burying yard, and within the land of his friend and neighbor, Mrs. Sarah Leavenworth, that lady conveyed by deed to his heirs 648 square feet of land, including his grave and also that of his wife, which land was to be used "for the purpose of a burying ground for the said Joseph Hopkins, Esq., deceased, and his family and their descendants forever, with liberty to enclose the same in such manner as they shall deem expedient."
Since 1801, three enlargements have been made to the original burying-yard. The deeds conveying the land have, in all cases, specified the use to which it was to be devoted, notably the last one, bearing date May 6, 1847, in which James M. L. Scovill did convey by deed to William Tyler, bishop of the Roman Catholic diocese of Hartford, in trust for the Roman Catholics of Waterbury, a certain tract of land adjoining the burying ground. Said deed contained the following words:
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" Provided, and this deed is upon the condition that the above described premises are to be used and occupied for the purpose of a burying ground and no other pur- pose." Should the Roman Catholics relinquish their right to this land, it would, without doubt, revert to the heirs of J. M. L. Scovill, and the same dilemma would occur in an attempt to divert the other lands from their specified uses. The heirs of Joseph Hopkins are many and are scatered far and wide throughout the United States. The heirs of the " inhabitants of Waterbury in 1805" are tens of thousands, dwelling no man knoweth where, and the heirs of the planters of Mattatuck, the owners of the ancient " God's acre," no man may number.
Let us look for a moment into the mortal history of this bit of land, and ask : Are we willing to let it go? For more than a century, there were gathered into the western portion of this most ancient place of burial within the township the men and women who braved the perils and endured the toils and bore with heroic fortitude the untold severity of the struggle with flood and wilderness, with want and woes that would appall stouter hearts than beat with us to-day. Here lie the mothers who guarded their children alike from peril by beast of the forest and stealthy tread of outraged Indian. Here were gathered for their long rest, in the place of their choice, the men who wrought mightily for us, in ways that need no mention, and whose integrity of purpose is the chief glory that glistens so brightly above our commonwealth to-day. These men and women, who lie beneath the sod in marked and unmarked graves, are they who trod the wilderness to come hither, who first turned the soil to make it glad with harvest, who built the first houses and created the first homes, surrounded by the hills that shut them solemnly in. They reared the first house for the worship of God in this then great wilderness. It was they who gathered sadly on Burying Yard hill and made within this ground the unknown grave of the first unknown dead of their number, who was borne-we know not when, we know not how-to this lonely place of burial.
Here lie the mortal remains of men whose names, as the centuries grow, will rise, as the number of them increases, into higher places in the estimation of coming generations. Already men and women are coming hither, are making long jour- neys to the old burying yard, to search therein for some memorial that shall enable them to say : "This is the spot where lies my ancestor of honored memory."
Let us beautify the place where rest the proprietors of Mattatuck, where lies the first minister of the town, the Rev. Jeremiah Peck; where lies his successor, the Rev. John Southmayd, whose services as public recorder deserve unbounded gratitude ; and his successor, the Rev. Mark Leavenworth, whose long pastorate deserves a long, unmolested rest. Let us honor the graves of our early physicians, Dr. Daniel Porter and the aged Dr. Ephraim Warner. We will name but one name more, save that of Deacon Thomas Judd, and that name shall be Hannah, the mother of the Rev. Samuel Hopkins and the grandmother of Samuel Hopkins, D. D., the sound of whose name and the light of whose life should keep alive and illumine the place of his birth forever. There are heroes lying here; men who lived and fought and died, full of patriotic love of country. There is one family name that has come down through all the generations from the time of 1678, and is there engraved on seventy-seven tombstones that still stand despite the ruin into which the place has fallen, in testimony of the faithfulness with which the Bronsons remembered their dead.
Oh, let not the coming generations that shall return to Waterbury reproach us of to-day in that we let go the one thing that we ought to prize most of all that we have of inheritance-the graves of our fathers, of the men who lay down to die in the full trust that the place they had prepared for their burial would remain for-
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ever inviolate. Shall we prove ourselves less true to our trust than the men of Boston and the men of Hartford, who turn proudly to their ancient places of burial, and would not bestow them, even to hold the tomb of a Grant, or the monument of a Washington ?
Mrs. Dudley's protest appeared in the Republican of September 3, in the following emphatic terms:
I have been notified, as a lineal descendant of both John Bronson and Captain Samuel Hickox, that there is talk in Waterbury of converting the old graveyard into a public park. It seems incredible that the last decade of the enlightened nineteenth century should record an idea of that kind. I have seventy-seven rela- tives buried in that old graveyard in Waterbury, and I send to that town seventy- seven protests against desecration-one for each closed mouth. Their toiling hands started your manufactories; their eyes beheld your pleasant valley, and they fought for it. Their ears heard Indian yells and English guns, and yet when their worn out bodies sought repose in six feet of ground some of this generation of Waterbury people think it is too much to allow them. Who will add to my seventy-seven protests?
LUCY BRONSON DUDLEY.
Mrs. Hotchkiss wrote as follows-also in the Republican :
Will you allow me space to add my protest to Mrs. Dudley's against the desecra- tion of the old Grand street burying ground. I have two grandfathers, two grand- mothers, a father and stepfather, also many other relatives, buried there. Many times has my grandmother told me of the soldiers of the Revolution, as they passed her father's house on the way from Boston to Fishkill, or vice versa, stopping there for provisions or staying over night, or both, and always keeping a guard. . The present generation can hardly realize the sufferings and hardships of those early days of the soldiers and of those remaining at home, and it seems to me the valuable ground that they secured for their last resting place is none too good for their venerated dust to remain in, undesecrated by this generation, who have not patri- otism enough to beautify and keep it as the most sacred spot within the city, and thus to honor those who fought and worked for the liberties we to-day enjoy. Let those who have been endeavoring to obliterate these sacred graves pause ere it is too late, for they may yet be buried in Waterbury themselves, and a future generation may follow their example by endeavoring to make a public park of Riverside; for it is less than twenty-five years since there were interments in this old yard. But no ! away with such thoughts ! and let every sober, conscientious man and woman arise and say, Let us honor, defend and beautify the ground where our beloved dead are laid, even if that ground happens to be located in the city of Waterbury.
EMMA HOTCHKISS.
On January 4, 1891, the town deeded the land to the city (see Volume II, page 74). On April 24, Charles R. Baldwin, the mayor of the city, complied with the requirements of the above-men- tioned act only so far as to cause excavations to be made and the remaining stones to be sunken out of sight-sometimes, but not always, over the graves to which they belonged. In some cases two or three stones were buried together. The remainder were grouped in what was once the vault. April 26, 1891-truly Water-
43
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bury's "Black Friday" !* The grounds were subsequently graded, the trees closely trimmed and a retaining wall built on Meadow street, and a portion of the land was conveyed to the board of agents of the Bronson library, as appears from the deed recorded in Volume CXXVI of the Land Records.
When the excavation for the cellar of the Bronson Library building was made, many stones which the city had buried were taken out of the ground in a fair state of preservation; but no one cared for them, and the oldest and most valuable, lying scattered on the surface, were crushed under cart wheels.t Such as remain are now in the cellar of the library. The bones exhumed were buried, after much delay, in the southwest corner of the lot deeded to the library.
A record of the bodies removed in the spring of 1891 was kept by N. J. Welton. Some were taken out of town, some removed to Mill Plain cemetery, and others to Riverside. Among them were the remains of Susanna, wife of Thomas Bronson (and great-grand- mother of Dr. Henry Bronson), who had been buried 150 years.
OTHER EARLY CEMETERIES.
PINE HILL BURYING GROUND.
The second place of burial within the limits of the town was at Judd's Meadows (see page 278). The oldest legible inscription to be seen to-day is " A. Lewis, 1740," which refers to Abram, son of Deacon Joseph Lewis, who died in December, 1740, aged twenty years; the latest is: "Sarah B. Terrel [wife of Horatio] died October 14, 1836, aged 29 years." In a chart of this plot of land made by Wil- liam Ward of Naugatuck, there are forty-four recognizable graves, thirty-three of which are marked with legible inscriptions. Of the others, it is believed that four, bearing initials, one of which is "B" in each case, mark the graves of the four children of John Barnes who died in the great sickness of 1749. Eight of the persons whose ages are given were over seventy years of age, and two-Gideon Hikcox and Sarah, his wife-had lived more than ninety years. Fifteen of the stones bear the name of Terrell.
In 1890, William Ward, Willard Hopkins and James S. Lewis were appointed a committee by the town of Naugatuck to build
* Dr. Anderson on that day rescued the remains of the Rev. John Southmayd, and later the remains and tombstones of the Rev. Mark Leavenworth and Timothy Hopkins were preserved and removed. Mrs. Lucy Bronson Dudley had before this caused to be made a facsimile of the stone of the Rev. John Southmayd, which was broken several years ago. See further in " The Churches of Mattatuck," pp. 7, 8, 257-261.
+ See an article signed J. A., in the American of May 26, 1893.
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a wall on the south boundary of this cemetery, also to secure the bank on the west side. The sum expended was $650. J. H. Whitte- more and Mr. Ward were recently appointed by the directors of the Grove Cemetery association to report a plan to improve the grounds, which they have not yet completed. Through the efforts of Mr. Ward, this ancient burial place has been associated with the Hill- side cemetery of Naugatuck, as a beneficiary of $10,000, raised by inhabitants of the town of Naugatuck, and placed with the Grove Cemetery association as trustee.
HILLSIDE CEMETERY.
The first grave made in Hillside cemetery was for Harvey, infant son of Deacon Elisha Stevens, upon land that Stevens owned near his own house. The date was March 9, 1795. Five years later (Feb- ruary 7, 1800) Deacon Stevens, for $6.25, deeded to the town, through its selectmen, sixty-three rods of land in Salem society, "lying a little southeast of my dwelling-house, and where it has been im- proved for a burying ground, butting northwest and south on my own land, reserving one and one-half rods square, where I and my family have made some burials." A later deed- May 12, 1830-from the heirs of Elisha Stevens, conveys for $48.75, thirty-five rods on the north side and ninety-nine rods on the south side of the land deeded in 1795, " reserving to ourselves six rods adjoining the one and one-half already reserved." This yard has been " set in order " without and within through the liberality and under the direction of Mr. Whittemore, and is now in the care of the Grove Cemetery association.
NORTHBURY BURYING PLACES.
The earlier of the two burying yards in Northbury parish was in present Thomaston. It was laid out according to a town act of December 9, 1735, the land having been purchased from Elnathan Taylor (see page 363). The only right that Taylor reserved was " a right and liberty for myself and my heirs to bury our dead in it." The Town hall stands upon the land once occupied by this cemetery.
The burying yard upon Plymouth hill was originally a part of the village green. The earliest burials seem to have taken place about 1749; at least the oldest stones bear date of that year, and the ground is in a good state of preservation.
WESTBURY BURYING YARD.
The reader will find on page 329 the record of the layout of this place of graves and a word-picture of the first burial there, the date
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of which was April 1, 1741. The original list of deaths kept by Timothy Judd is in possession of his descendant, James A. Skilton of New York, and is the oldest record of that nature which remains to us. It is a small book, measuring four and a half by three and a half inches, and has lost one leaf in the front and a portion of one leaf at the back. Mr. Skilton thinks that when the Rev. N. S. Rich- ardson printed in 1845 his Record of Mortality in Watertown, he evidently had not seen this book, as his memorandum differs in many ways from the original; also that his father, Dr. Avery J. Skilton of Troy, N. Y., had not seen it when he made his copy in an account book kept by James Skilton from 1802 until 1848. "At what time these records were so copied, or from what originals, I have," says Mr. Skilton, "been unable to learn." A few of the items of interest found in the original and not in the copies are the follow- ing:
Sept. 28, 1761, Dropt down dead in the path uncle Tho. Upson.
Nov. 16, 1764, Died uncle John Root of Kinsington in his seventy-ninth year.
March 8, 1765, was taken in a fit at the Widow Stow's, Doct. Mun of Woodbury & died in about seven minutes.
June 2, 1768, was taken with an Appoplectic & died Immediately the wife of Stephen Judd, Lydia by name.
June 8, 1773, Died with the consumption, in his passage from Sandacroix, Tim- othy Richards.
July 28, 1754: Died Serjant David Strickland.
March 15, 1766: Died old Mr. Joseph Prichard [of Milford].
July 30, 1768: Died, Serg. Caleb Clark.
June 27, 1769: Died at Stephen Matthewss house, James Parker of Chester, a boy of about ten years of age.
May 7, 1770: Died in a fitt of Appoplex, as the jury adjudged, Mr. Benjamin Wetmore.
Sept. 21, 1771: Died Jack Negro Man to Benjamin Richards.
Aug. 14, 1772: Died with the kick of a colt, within a little more than 24 hours, the eldest child of John foot, aged 5 years.
January 17, 1773: Died James Outis (?) a Tranchent Person at the widow Edwardss house.
January 13, 1774: Died Abi, eldest child to Jacob foot. and the same day Justus Daley's leg was cut off.
February 5, 1774: Abijah Garnsey's leg was cut off.
June 7, 1775: Died Bethel, son to William Scovill, killed by a Trees falling on him.
December 14, 1776: Died Daniel Tyler's Junr, two children, which were all he had, and were buried at Break Neck.
March 23, 1777: Died Ensign James Smith.
March 21, 1778: Was killed with the fall of a tree, Edward Scovill, Junr.
Oct. 16, 1779: Was killed with a cart the only son and child of William Scovill.
Jan. II, 1781: Was drow'd in a well, a son to Eldad Andrus.
June 5, 1781: Died Seth Blake. (Last entry.)
For other deaths, taken from this book, see pages 437 and 467.
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FARMINGBURY CEMETERIES.
At a town meeting held December 31, 1764, "Captain George Nichols and Captain Stephen Upson, Jr., were chosen a committee to go out eastward near Joseph Atkins' to view and purchase half an acre of land upon the town cost, in that neighborhood where they shall think it most convenient for a burying yard " (see page 402). In Bronson's History (page 229) this date is given as 1734, and the statement is made that the above action referred to East Farms. Joseph Atkins lived near the present centre of Wolcott, and this purchase was the beginning of the Wolcott Centre burying ground. The oldest inscribed stone standing therein is to the memory of Lieutenant Heman Hall; the date is 1769. On April 13, 1795, a com- mittee was appointed to confer, and contract if possible, with Wil- liam Stevens "for a small tract of land to sequester to the use of the public for a burying ground, and to take a deed of him, or to report to the town." On June 16, 1797-the year after Farmingbury society became the town of Wolcott-Waterbury directed that Wol- cott should be paid £3, ros., to be applied to the payment in part of their burying ground. In 1797, Stevens still laid claim to a portion of the burying ground, and Wolcott appointed a committee to settle with him, which was finally accomplished in December, 1798. Stevens' name appears on the Waterbury tax list of 1793 as a resi- dent of Southington.
In March, 1772, the society of Farmingbury appointed three grave diggers, indicating the existence of three graveyards, one of which, at the centre, John Barrett had charge of for many years. The second we should not fail to mention, since, whether within Waterbury limits or not, Waterbury residents were there interred. It is on Pike's hill, and but six stones bearing inscriptions remain. The names are Alcox, Blakeslee and Bracket; the dates are from 1776 to 1791.
EAST FARMS CEMETERY.
"It is supposed," says Sturges M. Judd, " that the first two inter- ments at East Farms were of two Revolutionary soldiers who died here on the march from Newport, R. I., to Newburg, N. Y., in 1776." That this tradition may be correct save for the date, is inferred from the petition which Dr. Timothy Porter presented in 1786 to the General Assembly, in which he states that in September, 1777, a portion of the army, under command of Colonel Angel of Rhode Island, passed through Waterbury; that William Edwards, on ac- count of a wound in his ankle, by which he was in danger of losing life or limb, was left under Porter's care. Porter was assured that
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whenever he should present his bill to Captain Thomas Dutton, collector of state taxes, his taxes would be abated; but Dutton kept the bill for three years and then returned it.
On January 31, 1780, a committee was appointed by the town to purchase one-fourth acre on the request of Captain Phineas Castle. On April 1, was surveyed "a piece of ground, five by eight rods, at the East farm," which Joseph Beach sold on April 28 for fifteen shil- lings, described as "in my meadow, a little southwest of my dwell- ing house, with the privilege of passing to and from said burying- yard from the Country road" (see page 448). The oldest inscribed stone seems to be that of Experience, the wife of Joseph Beach, who died September 20, 1789.
In 1855, the plot was enlarged by a gift of land from Charles J. Pierpont. By an act of the legislature passed in 1878, the East Farms Cemetery corporation was organized.
GUNNTOWN CEMETERY.
Nathaniel Gunn, who died October 25, 1769, was buried in Pine Hill cemetery, as was his first wife, Sarah, who died in 1756. His widow -- also Sarah-was buried at Gunntown in 1797. These facts have led to the belief that this burying-yard was not laid out until after 1760, and probably not until after the organization of the Gunntown Episcopal church in 1784. Dr. Enos Osborn, born after 1737, gave the ground to the Episcopal society, but after the church was removed to Salem, some rights must have remained with the Osborn family, for Enos Adams, a descendant of the family, in 1860 deeded it to the town of Naugatuck.
The oldest person here buried is Mrs. David Peck of Derby, who died in 1867, aged more than one hundred years. The earliest death here recorded is that of a child of Noah and Abigail (Gunn) Sco- vill, who died in 1790, although there seem to be some older graves unmarked. The young man from whose gravestone the following inscription is taken, was of marked ability, and was in charge, at the time of his death, of workmen who were building a church steeple:
Erected to the memory of John A. Smith, son of John and Jennett Smith, who was killed instantly at Madison, Ct., by falling from the steeple of a church, May 18, 1838, aged 20 years.
" Beneath this sacred mould, rest, hapless youth At whose disastrous end e'en strangers wept, Whose dying bed was the cold earth, and whose Last groan nor friend nor parent herd- Parental love, denied to sooth that hour, O'er thy dear dust this humble stone erects,
To bear thy precious name and publish
To the passing traveller thy woe."
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After the church edifice at Gunntown was removed to the village of Salem, and the new Congregational church was its neighbor, it is said that Daniel Beecher conveyed to the Episcopal society land in the rear of its church for a burial-yard, and that for a considerable time it was in use .* Removals from it were made to Hillside cem- etery, while other graves still remain under and about the horse- sheds now belonging to that church.t
MIDDLEBURY BURYING PLACES.
The earliest place of burial in Middlebury, laid out in 1771 (see page 408), has entirely disappeared. Two stones only in the pres- ent graveyard are known to have been removed from the older one; those of two daughters of Captain Isaac and Mary (Bracket) Bron- son, who died in 1776 and 1777. The following vote, passed on January 27, 1794, seems to refer to the present cemetery: "Voted that the petition of Mr. Eli Bronson, praying for a burying ground in Middlebury society, be referred to the selectmen, with power to grant said petition and make such compensation to the proprietor of said ground as they think best."
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