USA > Massachusetts > Plymouth County > Bridgewater > Epitaphs in old Bridgewater, Massachusetts : illustrated with plans and views > Part 1
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Gc 974.402 B76& 1897014
M. G.
REYNOLDS HISTORICAL GENEALOGY COLLECTION
ALLEN COUNTY PUBLIC LIBRARY 3 1833 01105 7707
Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2015
https://archive.org/details/epitaphsinoldbri00lath
EPITAPHS
IN
OLD BRIDGEWATER,
MASSACHUSETTS.
BY WILLIAMS LATHAM.
illustrated with flants and Viems.
APPENDIX
added data from the 1887 Annual Report of East Bridgewater, Mass. Report of the Committee on the Old Graveyard
BRIDGEWATER, MASS.
1882.
" Here trace the moss-grown stones Where rest their mouldering hones." JOHN DAVIS
Reprinted through the courtesy of the East Bridgewater, Massachusetts Public Library by the Plymouth County Chapter of the Massachusetts Society of Genealogests as a Bi-centennial Chapter Project in 1976
HENRY T. PRATT, PRINTER, BRIDGEWATER. 199:
Reprinted by CHEDWATO SERVICE Middleboro, Massachusetts 1976
1897014
-
909900 - 96-98 troue Pourtrud 00910
PREFACE.
This work is a private enterprise, not undertaken for gain or re- muneration, but because it is work such as would not probably be done if I did not, do it .; and because it is a preservation of facts which may otherwise be lost.
It has grown, by slow degrees, from a pamphlet of fifty pages, with five hundred epitaphs, to a book of 250 pages, with some 2500 epitaphs ; and instead of a history of one grave yard, as originally con- templated, we have the history and epitaphs, with plans, of ten grave- yards, and of one grave-yard entire, without a plan, and additions from private yards.
We now present a complete list of all, epitaphs in all old public grave-yards commenced before 1800, with plans and with some account of the old grave yards of the three towns of West Bridgewater, Bridge- water and East Bridgewater, including all monuments in those yards, down to the present time, and also, most of the epitaphs in private and small pox yards.
The labor has been much greater than was anticipated. Several persons have been employed to copy inscriptions, and to locate and number monuments on the plans. Mr. Joshua E. Crane, Jr., has done most of this work in Bridgewater, and Walter M. Swift and Henry Har- low have done the most of it in West Bridgewater and East Bridge- water.
We are much indebted to Mitchell's History of Bridgewater for the notes within parenthesis added to Epitaphs ; to Walter L. Keith, for the use of his plate of the Keith coat of arms; and to Bradford Kingman, Esq., for original sketches drawn by him especially for this work, of the Edson & Keith Tombs at page 18, and also for views of the houses of Rev. James Keith, opposite page 238.
VIII
PREFACE.
Eight of these plans are drawn from actual survey of the premises, giving courses and distances ; and two of them, the Powder-house and Jerusalem yards, are drawn from measurment of the outside line, giv- ing their distances, and general coures.
We have used our utmost endeavors to make this work accurate and reliable, for in that lies the value of a work of this kind ; but that is next to impossible, for errors will creep in, and the next best thing we can do is to be honest, and publish a full list of errors, with cor- rections, that have come to our knowledge, after a long, close and careful examination and comparison of inscriptions, copies, proof- sheets and printed text.
In all of these burial places, the graves generally head west and foot east, or nearly so. In all indexes, when age is given, it is set down and called forty-nine years old, when it is stated that the person died " in the fittieth year of his age," or "in his fiftieth year," or words to that effect ; and in that way the age is reckoned and stated in all periods of life.
WILLIAMS LATHAM.
BRIDGEWATER, NOV. 4, 1882.
CONTENTS.
WEST BRIDGEWATER.
Grave-yard near F. E. Howard's,
5. 54
66
the late Judge Daniel Howard's
I
the Powder House,
33
66 road to Jerusalem,
45
the late Abiezer Alger's,
5I
BRIDGEWATER.
66
Unitarian Church ·
55
corner of Cross and Vernon Streets, 103
66 Meeting-house in Scotland, . 113
the late Zephaniah Keith's, on South Street,
129
66 Trinity Church,
145
Jenning's Brook,
161
66 in Great Woods,
173
66 Small pox,
.
18I
EAST BRIDGEWATER.
near Town-house
183
Railroad, on Hill Farm,
186
the late Nathan Hudson's,
191
the late Earl Thayer's,
191
the late Eleazer Whitman's
192
James Keith's Tomb,
238
House,
238
List of Errors and Corrections,
249
General Index of Surnames,
251
Edward Capen's .
7. 237
ILLUSTRATIONS.
Keith Coat of Arms, Frontispiece.
Tomb of Dea. Samuel Edson, 18
Inscription on the same,
18
Tomb of Rev. James Keith, .
18
House of Rev. James Keith,
238
Portrait of Dea. John Whitman, 1735-1842,
244
PLANS.
-
Old Grave-yard, West Bridgewater,
I
Powder House,
33
Jerusalem,
45
Old Grave-yard, Bridgewater,
55
Vernon Street,
103
Scotland,
113
South Street, 66
129
Trinity Church, 66
145
Jenning's Brook,
161
Old Grave-yard, East Bridgewater,
183
560 20 E 10480
33323130
1 6 33 Section A
26 252423
27 28
3
18 17
1
20
222 15657
55 54 $3
5
.
4
32
Old
189
10g 110
106
90
32 111
68.
82
129 113 128
107
114
169
121 126
115 /08, 105
185
124
103
153'
6
104
102
82
150
152
154
118
100
149
122
144
148. 14>
212 1
196
190191
/33
143
736
2/3 214
209 208
192
142 134 141 135
137 238
2.37 230
2/> 205
and Led
Taunton
254
2.29
253
2$5
,256 27X
282,
252"
25 / 257
250 258
223 2
2 42 249
243
244 248247 x 2 63
NOW
270
269
302
303
296 ৳ 303
Section F:
South
Street
$49'25 W 44SE
86 84
10
66 67
6061 62
87 83 88
45 46 47
89
68 69
51504948
91
0/12
67
183
182 181
170
166
104
98
165
Section C.
133 10 189
Boston
145 146
163
210 9
Sector D. 190 to
S25°20'E 4455
1337 138
2 39 240
228
22> 226
204
294
2/8
293
219
292
225 220 203
241
Road 542# 10'E 264ft
200 26/2622>2
29,90
200 26> 266
242 to 295
Section E.
206
198
195 194
215 2.216
207
241
193
295
130'
18,87 86
$ 4020' E 285ft
9 10 11
85
64 65
.5859
52
39 4042-4 344
37
38
34 Section B.
Old Grave Yard West Bridgewater Area 211 Rods 1881
29 35 36
678
13/2
63
34 to 132
$ 905'E HOPE
184
155
151
162
16/
280
OLD GRAVE-YARD - - IN
WEST BRIDGEWATER.
The Old Grave-yard in West Bridgewater, on the east side of Taunton Road, leading from Mill River to Mile Brook Bridge, now called South Street, was originally one acre of land, and about forty years ago was enlarged by an addition of land on the north and east sides, to its present form and quantity, to wit : nearly a triangle, and containing one acre, one quarter and eleven rods of land, then making a carriage way on the northerly and easterly side, as appears by the plan hereto annexed, made from an actual survey of the premises, and then enclosing the whole ground with a stone wall, as now app sars.
Some ten years ago the ground had become grown over to bushes, trees, wild grass and weeds, the stones covered with moss, and out of position. A subscription was raised, the ground was dug over, graded and smoothed, the headstones cleaned and righted, the footstones re- moved to the back side of the headstones, and otherwise disposed of, so that the ground is now in comfortable condition for mowing, and for being kept in good order in the future.
There is but one reference to this ground as a grave-yard in the old records, and that is its grant by the Proprietors of Bridgewater for a burial-place, and is found in the first volume of said Proprietors' Rec- ords at the top of page 153, in the hand-writing of Samuel Allen, who was the second Town and Proprietors' Clerk, from 1683 to 1702, and is in these words, under the head of "Edward Fobes :"
"more, one aker and half and one aker for a burying place, liing at the hed of this aker and half liing at the hed of his tow house lot that hee bought of John Cary, bounded at the hed by tow red ok or black oke saplings."
2
WEST BRIDGEWATER,
There is no date to this grant or record. It was without doubt after 1683. as Mr. Allen was not clerk till December 1683. The record on the preceding page, 152, under the head of "The lands of Edward Fobes in the Township of Bridgewater, both uplands and meadow," is in the hand writing of John Cary, the first Town and Proprietors' Clerk, from the first settlement of the town in 1651, to the day of his death, October 31, 1681. Dea. Edward Fobes, son of John Fobes, an orig- inal proprietor, then lived where Dwelly Fobes now lives, and owned two house or garden lots, 24 x 80, 12 acres, bounded west by Samuel Edson, and east by road to Taunton, being the present road by his house and the burying-place, and the two house lots, 24 x So, referred to in this record as bought of John Cary, mean the two house lots oppo- site the dwelling house of said Edward Fobes, now Dwelly Fobes, bounded east by John Ames, and west by the road aforesaid, which two house lots last named were owned, occupied and lived upon by John Cary, Jr., son of the old and first Town Clerk, who moved to Bristol, then a part of the Old Colony of Plymouth, and now in Rhode Island, and said Cary, Jr., of Bristol, sold and conveyed said two house lots to said Edward Fobes by deed dated July 7, 1683, recorded in Plym- outh Registry, book 20, page 123. The acre and half mentioned in said record lay at the head of these two house lots, and the one acre, referred to for a burying place, lay at the head of the one acre and half, and is the present burying-ground, except the additions made some forty years ago, as above stated. This ground was probably not used at all for a burying-place till after its grant for that purpose, and the grant was not made till after July 7, 1683, and may not have been for some years after that.
The epitaphs fail to show that this ground was used much, if any, for the burial of persons living and dying in other parts of the town, afterward known as South, East and North Precincts. According to Firestone account Dea. Samuel Edson died 1692, his wife 1699. Rev. James Keith's first wife 1705, he 1719. all buried in this yard Hear each other. The next five persons having grave stones and buried here are a child of Doct. Perkins, 1720, a child of George Williams, 1721, Hannah, wife of Comfort Willis, 1723. a. 64, Martha Forbes, 1725. , 6, and Joseph Keith, 17.30. a. 55, said Joseph Keith being the only care of the rane children of Rev. James Keith, the exact date of whose Inth is known. He was no doubt born February 14, 1675, as stated off his grave-store, and died September 27. 1730.
3
OLD GRAVE YARD.
A memoir of Royal Keith, with annals of the Keith family of Scot- land, a pamphlet of 24 pages, was published at Boston 1873, by C. E. Keith, & Co., in which memoir on the 7th page is given an account of the birth of the children of the Rev. James Keith, putting down the exact date of the birth of each of his nine children, naming them in the or- der in which they are named in Mitchell's History of Bridgewater, as follows :
"James Keith, born December 5. 1669 ;
Joseph Keith, " November 8, 1671 ;
Samuel Keith,
December 20, 1673 ;
Timothy Keith, April 3, 1675 ;
John Keith, 66
October 4, 1676 ;
Josiah Keith
December 25, 1678 ;
Margaret Keith, " November 2, 1682 ;
Mary Keith,
April 3, 1684 ;
Susanna Keith, " March 10, 1687."
This account of the dates of the births of these children is believed to be wholly incorrect, without authority, and was altogether conjectu- ral. Two of the three daughters, and four of the six sons of Minister Keith, lived and died in Bridgewater. These four sons have grave- stones, giving the date of their deaths and ages, and one of them, said Joseph Keith, giving the exact date of his birth, as well as his death, as before stated. The other three sons have grave-stones reading as follows :
I. SAMUEL "died February 3, 1759 in the 82 year of his age." He was buried in Scotland, part of the South Precinct of old Bridgewater.
2. TIMOTHY "died November 8, 1767, aged 84." Buried in Cam- pello, part of North Precinct, now Brockton.
3. JOHN "died June 11, 1761 in the 73rd year of his age." Bur- ied in the Old Yard, South Precinct, now Bridgewater.
There is no record of the birth or death of the other five children of Rev. James Keith, who have no grave-stones. Two of his daughters lived and died in Bridgewater, now West Bridgewater. James died in Mendon, Josiah died in Easton, and Margaret probably died in Reho- both. Their births and deaths are unknown except as before errone- ously stated in that memoir, which is incorrect and unreliable, if grave- stones tell the truth.
1
WEST BRIDGEWATER,
There were but one monument in this ground before 1700, six before 1730. Shirts seven before 1750, and one hundred and seventy-four be- fore 1800, and three hundred and four all told, down to the present time.
This gold card has not been much used for a burial-place for the last thirty years or more, and only two interments have been made for the last ten years. There is now in this yard one tomb on the north side of the ground called the Baxter tomb, and now owned by Withington Gi'dwell: and there are three tombs near the middle of the yard, be- longing, one to the Heirs of Benjamin B. Howard, deceased ; one to the the heirs of Judge Danie! Howard, deceased ; and one to the heirs of Chirles Howard and Wm. Ames, deceased ; all built about 1824. None of these tombs have any occupants.
Where were the dead buried for upward of thirty years previous to the use of this grave yard, which was not used till after 1683 ?
The first notice of any other burying-place is to be found in the Propri- un' Records, Vol. I. at the bottom of page 248, in the hand-writing of Sangue Men, Proprieters' Clerk, made in the year 1689. under the herboy " The hands of John Field both upland and meadow land hear In the Tour of Bridgewater." It is as follows :
"Impregn acre and halfe joying to the westerly side of his lundiking of the north side of Meeting House, ranging He thong the side of his hand, being foure pole wide in mesiyle bounded in the corner next the Meeting House old Thomas Body's land by a stone pitched into the ground not so comrang at the length of his hand to the highway as o cons of Supply Hit with all bange for highway on line bosat santan good and the burying place ! - to those ambas s' have made choise of it."
1689 1
The tiếng bronce by ty buying phire found in the old records, is in the first videoand the Wes Precinct Record, at the bottom of page Fax : + Wondering of Vorbeiel Brett, Precinct Clerk, and is as fol
Via thesting of the West Precinct in Bridgewater. Vocemayo. 26. 1726. the Predict past a clear vote for build jog 000% Meeting House if the burning place to je north- ward of the center w travel."
I have mesforis the betongplace referred to in these two records of Hat and 1929 De coffe and the same place, and is where the Rev. March30 fo que 00 08 35. 5 MC Faul Cupen in 1545, dug the cel-
5
OLD GRAVE YARD.
lars for their houses, and land between and adjacent thereto. When the cellars were dug several graves, human bones and remains of cof- fins were found in each of these cellars, which are about eight rods apart, and there is a tradition in the neighborhood that a certain negro was buried under an apple tree then and there near by standing, show- ing the burying-place to have occupied forty or fifty square rods of ground.
The meeting-house referred to in the first. record was the second meeting-house built in Bridgewater, 1674, enlarged 1694, and taken down 1731, and was then, 1689, standing where the Three Decker was built, 1731, and taken down 1823, and where the Soldiers' Monument now stands, built in 1879. John Field then lived where Jonathan Howard now lives, and Snell's land was where the old Byram Tavern House now stands.
The burying-place, referred to in the second record above, was no doubt the ground on the east side of the Boston road from the meet- ing-house to Sandy Hill, opposite to the dwelling-house of the late Gamaliel Howard. The centre of the travel means the centre of the travel of all the rateable inhabitants of West Precinct, for the purpose of locating the new meeting-house which they were desirous to build, and which was built 1731.
The Precinct in 1728 voted to build a new meeting-house in the cen- tre of travel of all rateable inhabitants of West Precinct, andchose a committee to measure and find out the centre. No report is to be found and it does not appear where that centre was ; then comes the vote of November 26, 1729, above cited. Next comes the vote of December 24, 1729, to set it at the west end or near the old house, giving the names of forty-eight persons voting for it, and finally, after many par- ish meetings, and an appeal to the Legislature, it was voted, June 8, 1731, to set the meeting-house at the west end of the old house, accord- ing to the order and recommendation of the Great and General Court, and to pull down the old house to make room for the new one.
No other grave-yard north of this place is known to have existed at this time, 1689 to 1729, and I should judge the centre of the travel to be south of these premises. There were but few settlements at this time, 1729, in the north part of the town.
A few graves have been found in the field and ground south of Fran- cis E. Howard's house, on the west side of the Boston road from Ben-
N'EST BRIDGEWATER,
jamin Howard's house to the house of said Francis, and there were, within the memory of man, graves with natural stones, without inscrip- tion, within the limits of the highway, but west of the line of travel, at this place, and there is a tradition in the neighborhood of some burials here : but nothing definite or certain is known of its being a burying place of much extent, though it appears to have been, probably, the hist burying-place in Bridgewater, and that opposite the house of Ga. maliel Howard the second, and that on the east side of Taunton road to be the third. This first yard, probably not much used after the third yard was established, in 1683 or later. This first yard is situated about half way between the house of Rev. James Keith, built 1661, enlarged 1677, and now owned and occupied by George M. Pratt, and the sup- posed site of the first meeting-house, built in 1661, taken down 1674, and which probably stood on the west side of the old Boston road south of Francis E. Howard's house, or on the north side of the old road lead- ing from the Green, or soldier's monument, westerly, and north of the houses of Francis Perkins and Jonathan Howard, and by the house of Samuel Packard, now gone, to the Boston road north of the old How- ard Tavern House, now gone. This old road, probably the first made upon the bank of the river, was straight from point to point, and was al- lowed to be " stopped up by John Howard and John Field, 1710, and turned down the lane " on the bank of the river as now used for a highway in front of Jonathan Howard's house ; but the first meeting. house most likely stood near the first burying ground.
The settlement of Bridgewater commenced 1651, and began near Conster's Kitchen, and extended eastwardly, on the banks of Town River, with such paths and ways, running mostly east and west, from one house to another, on each bank of the river, as were needed for their personal convenience, until 1668, seventeen years after their first location, when a jury of twelve men of Bridgewater were impannelled, and laid out four roads for public convenience, two of them starting from the meeting house of 1661, wherever situated, one toward Boston, and one toward Taunton, and two other roads branching off from these two fonds above named-one at Sandy Hill, towards Plymouth, and one at the head of Edward Fibes' two house lots, towards the Great Meadows.
It was a practice in old times to have the meeting house, the grave- yard, and the monster's house close together, especially the two first ; and if the ground south of Francis E. Howard's was a burial-place dur-
7
OLD GRAVE YARD.
ing the first thirty or more years of this settlement, it would be near the meeting-house and minister's house, whether we assume the first meeting. house to have been located east of the Boston road, near the Samuel Packard house as heretofore suggested, or we assume that it stood on the west side of that road south of F. E. Howard's house.
We fail to find grave-stones prior to 1700, with one exception, and very few prior to 1740, and we are unable to find other record evidence that either of these two places were used for burial ; although it is highly probable that they were both burial-places during the first thirty years, and occasionally used for some time afterwards.
The Boston, Plymouth and Taunton road, through West Bridge- water, laid out by a jury of twelve men, 1668, has always been under- stood to be the road leading from Mile Brook Bridge, by the old bury- ing-ground, Dwelly Fobes's house, over Town River, by the houses of Benjamin and Francis E. Howard, by the present meeting-house, and by the house of the late Gamaliel Howard, to Sandy Hill, north of the late Jonathan Copeland's house.
Each of these roads starts from the meeting-house. The Plymouth and Boston is one road, from the meeting house to Sandy Hill ; and the Taunton road runs from the meeting-house to John Haward's, and thence over the river to Mile Brook Bridge (meaning the old tavern house of the first John Howard) .. This meeting-house, being the first meeting house in old Bridgewater, stood on the Boston and Taunton road, through Bridgewater, and probably on the west side of it, be- tween the houses of said Benjamin and Francis E. Howard.
Grave-yards grow, decay, disappear and are soon forgotten. Grave- stones were expensive and difficult to be obtained. Native flat stones, set in the ground edgewise, at the head and foot of graves, were suffi- cient to identify the resting places of friends for the time being, and graves during the memory of man were recognized ; but after the lapse of a few generations, and long ago becoming unknown, have been de- molished, stones removed and ground levelled and smoothed. There are but few grave-stones with inscriptions thereon during the first one hundred.years after the settlement of Bridgewater. The earliest stones were generally for young children, and there is much doubt and un- certainty what yard, or in what part of the yard, the first settlers were buried, or when burial-places were first established, who gave the land, or how right of burial was acquired.
In order to locate and number the grave-stones, and to aid in find-
8
W'EST BRIDGEWATER,
ing grave-stones, we have divided the ground into six sections, num- bered A to E, each section, except A and F, being 64 feet wide. The line between section A and B begins 42 feet southerly from the north-west corner of the grave-yard, and runs nearly an east course to the northeast corner of the yard. As seen upon the plan, figures repre- sent grave-stones, and all graves head west and foot east.
We begin at the west end of Section A, and go easterly, and locate and number each head-stone, the first stone 1, the next 2, the next 3. and so on until we locate and number all stones in that section, which amount to thirty-three stones. We then go into Section B, at the east- erly end, and go westerly locating each stone, and numbering the first stone 34, next 35, and so on, until we get to the west end of section B, the last number in that section being 132. We then go into the west end of Section C, and locate and number the first stone 133, and go easterly, numbering all stones until we get to the easterly end of Sec- tion C, number 189, and so through all the sections, numbering all stones, and finding, in the whole, 304 stones, counting each monument for Edson, Keith, Angier and Reed as one stone, and excluding the four tombs.
EPITAPHS
-IN THE-
OLD GRAVE-YARD,
- IN-
WEST BRIDGEWATER
1. Daniel Howard, Esq., born April 24, 1749, died Aug. 23, 1833. Abigail, wife of Daniel Howard, Esq., born Oct. 15, 1754, died July 5, 1818.
2. Freelove, wife of Josiah Willis, formerly wife of Wm. Fobes, died April 27, 1854, æ 78.
3. Mr. William Fobes, died 30th April, 1812, in his 45 year,
4. In memory of Mrs. Alice Witherell, who died Feb. 15, 1804, in her 61st year. Mr. Obediah Witherell, her husband, died in the West Indies, Aug. 30, 1775, æ 27.
5. Here lies burried Charlotte, Daughter of Capt. Abiel Ames, and Mrs. Olive, his wife, who died Feb. 1, 1797, in her 4th year.
6. Charles, Son of Mr. George Williams, Jr. He died Dec. 8, 1806, in his 12th mo.
7. George Williams, Jr., died Aug. 21, 1809, in his 35th year.
Tears flow, and cares not where the good man lies, Till all who know him follow
to the skies ;
Tears, therefore, fall
Where George's ashes sleep;
Him wife, friends, parent, children weep,
And justly few will over him transend, As husband, Parent, Child and Friend.
8. Mrs. Eunice Williams, Relict of Mr. George Williams, Jr., in the 36th year of her age.
Think. O! ve parents, think how great
How favored with your children in your view, Whilts you enjoy your health, your wealth and State, Prepare to follow me; teach them to follow you.
9. Sybel Porter, born Jan. 14, 1789, died Sept. 3, 1795, aged 6, years and 7 mos. Lucy and Lois, born Feb. 26, 1791. Lucy died Feb. 10, 1792, Lois died 1838. Drs. of Daniel and Abigail Howard.
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