Tag Archives: War of 1812

Cemetery of the Week #160: St. Ann’s Cemetery

Rhoads_StAnn_gateSaint Ann’s Cemetery
also called Sainte Anne’s Cemetery or the Catholic Cemetery
Garrison Road & Custer Street
Mackinac State Park
Mackinac Island, Michigan 49757
GPS: Lat: 45° 51′ 29″N, Lon: 84° 37′ 16″W
Founded: early 1850s
Size: 2 acres
Number of interments: approximately 1000
Open: Daily from sunrise to sunset
Information: Ste. Anne Catholic Church, PO Box 537, Mackinac Island, MI 49757

North of Michigan’s lower peninsula lies an island 8 miles in diameter. The local native tribes used it as a burial ground. Since it lies at the Straits of Mackinac between Lake Michigan and Lake Huron, the French based fur trading operations there. The British occupied Mackinac Island during the Revolutionary War and built a fort. After the War of 1812, the island came under American control, was minimally staffed during the Civil War, and eventually became a resort for the wealthy of Detroit and Chicago.

Rhoads_StAnn_horsesMotorized vehicles were banned on Mackinac Island in 1898, so to this day the chief modes of transportation are bicycles and horses.  The island, with its restored fort, livery stables, and fudge shops, is the #1 tourist attraction in Michigan.

Originally, Mackinac Island had only a Catholic burial ground, set up by French fur traders in 1779. That graveyard lay down near Sainte Anne’s Church, close to the water. For nearly a century, Mackinac Island simply had no Protestant community. Not until the fishing industry began in earnest toward the end of the 1800s did Calvinist missionaries come to preach to the fishermen and convert the natives.

Eventually that original Catholic cemetery filled to capacity. As early as 1852, islanders buried their dead on military reserve land near the Post Cemetery behind the fort. This was one of the few areas on the rocky island where the topsoil was deep enough to dig graves.

By the 1880s, most bodies from the first Catholic cemetery had been moved to Saint Ann’s. Not all the graves were transferred, however. Several stray headstones have been discovered in the weeds in town over the years. One now resides in the village museum. The site of that original Catholic cemetery, on Hoban and Market Streets, is prime land in the village now.

This newer Saint Ann’s Cemetery sprawls across an irregularly shaped piece of land, bounded by the curves of Garrison Road on the north and Custer Street on the west. The oldest graves lie on the Garrison side. Lots of stones date from the last half of the 19th century. They were ordered and shipped from the “mainland,” as islanders call Michigan’s Lower Peninsula.

Rhoads_StAnn_BiddleThe oldest marked grave in Saint Ann’s Cemetery belongs to 8-year-old Mary Biddle, who died after falling through the ice in December 1833. Her parents, Edward and Agatha Biddle, paid for a stone carved by W. E. Peters in Detroit (he signed his work) to mark her grave, which had been moved from the earlier cemetery. Her father Edward, who served as the village president, was buried in the Post Cemetery across the road.

Mary’s epitaph sums up the brevity of many children’s lives at the time:
“As the sweet flower that scents the morn
but withers in the rising day,
Thus lovely was this infant’s dawn,
Thus swiftly fled its life away.”

Rhoads_StAnn_GraveraetAlso buried in the cemetery is Lieutenant G. A. Graveraet, a 22-year-old who oversaw Confederate prisoners of war at Camp Douglas, the notoriously unsanitary camp near Chicago, before leading the 1st Michigan Sharpshooters Company K into battle at Spotsylvania. His tombstone says he died in Washington of wounds received before Petersburg. Sharing his monument is 1st Sgt. Henry G. Graveraet, 57, one of the “boys” in Company K, who died in the battle. Henry was G.A.’s father and died under his command.

In Summer 2011, a place in Saint Ann’s Cemetery was set aside for the burial of bones repatriated to the Sault Sainte Marie Chippewa by the Smithsonian Institution.

Later that year, when the foundation for a new hotel was being excavated at the site of the old cemetery in town, human remains were uncovered.  Although no anthropological analysis seems to have been performed, the bones were considered Native American. Since the Chippewa believe that the body has two souls — one that travels to the land of the dead and one that remains with the body forever, soaking into the soil — they believe the soil surrounding the bones should be preserved with the same respect as a body.

Because of that, a dumptruck was brought to the island.  It was filled with earth and a jumble of bones and unloaded in the Catholic cemetery, where a turtle mound has since been built. Nearby a totem pole was erected, along with a sign reading “Jiibay Gitigaan” in Ojibwa, which translates to “Spirit Garden.”  The turtle mound has 13 sections, for the 13 moons of the year celebrated by the Ojibwa.

Useful links:

The Fort Mackinac Post Cemetery on Cemetery Travel

More information on rhe oldest grave in St. Ann’s

Sainte Anne’s continues to be an active church on Mackinac Island

Remains discovered in 2012 were buried in the Catholic cemetery

More information on the turtle mound memorial

Cemetery of the Week #103: Drummond Hill Cemetery

The battle monument at the top of Drummond Hill Cemetery

The battle monument at the top of Drummond Hill Cemetery

Drummond Hill Cemetery
6110 Lundy’s Lane
Niagara Falls, Ontario, Canada
Telephone: Niagara Falls City Hall (905) 356-7521
Founded: 1799
Size: 4 acres
Number of interments: More than 3000

In the final years of the 18th century, a pioneer graveyard stood atop the hill on Lundy’s Lane, beside the First Presbyterian Church. Buried in the churchyard were British settlers who were farming the fertile land near one of the wonders of the natural world: Niagara Falls.

Grave of John Burch

Grave of John Burch

The EVP Society of Ontario says this cemetery contains some of the oldest gravestones in the area. The oldest surviving headstone in the graveyard dates to 1797. It remembers John Burch, who was initially buried on his own farm, but was reburied here in 1799. He was one of the earliest Loyalist pioneers in the area. In 1786, he had been one of the first to harness the Niagara River for commercial purposes, erecting saw and grist mills on the Upper Niagara Rapids.

To this day, the Niagara River and its waterfalls form a natural boundary between the United States and Canada. This became too close for comfort during the War of 1812.

My American education led me to believe that the Americans of the day were just calmly minding their own business when British soldiers attacked Washington, burned the Library of Congress, and generally were meanies in red coats. I didn’t know that American troops had invaded Canada in an attempt to annex Ontario.

The battle monument above the grave of 22 unknown British soldiers.

The battle monument above the grave of 22 unknown British soldiers.

The bloodiest battle of the war, which Canadians consider their Gettysburg, took place on July 25, 1814 in the churchyard of the First Presbyterian Church on Lundy’s Lane. American forces repeatedly attacked Lieutenant General Gordon Drummond’s men, who held the hilltop after six hours of fighting. Both sides suffered casualties estimated at 800 men each. In the end, claiming victory, the Americans withdrew to nearby Fort Erie, which they abandoned in November that year. The American invasion of Canada was over, but if the battle had gone differently, Ontario would now be an American state.

Drummond’s men were left on the hill with the task of burying the 1600 dead men in trenches in the old cemetery. Twenty-two British soldiers lie beneath the monument to the Battle of Drummond Hill, which stands at the crest of the hill. The monument includes an obelisk, a pair of cannons, cannonballs, and a British flag.

Other soldiers, mostly unknown, remain buried around the cemetery. SpiritSeekers reports that the soldiers’ average age was 15. Some of the men are believed to continue to haunt the cemetery, especially at night.

Laura Secord's monument was unveiled in 1901.

Laura Secord’s monument was unveiled in 1901.

Also buried in the cemetery is Canadian national hero Laura Secord. When American officers commandeered her home, she overheard them plotting an attack on the British outpost at DeCew’s Falls. She walked nearly 20 miles alone through woods and swamps to warn the British. Lieutenant FitzGibbons gathered the 50 men under his command, 15 militiamen, and a small force of Six Nation and other Indians, and attacked the Americans at Beaver Dams. The small British contingent caught the Americans by surprise and forced their surrender after capturing their commander and cannons.

A monument erected by the Ontario Historical Society now marks Secord’s grave.

Also buried in the graveyard is Karel Soucek, a daredevil who went over Niagara Falls in a barrel in 1984. His monument is topped with a cylinder and is decorated with a portrait of him, surrounded by a stylized cascade of falling water. It quotes him as saying, “It is better for a person to take a chance at life…than to live in that gray twilight and know not victory nor defeat.”

Daredevil Karel Soucek's gravestone

Daredevil Karel Soucek’s gravestone

The Niagara Parks Commission assumed jurisdiction of the cemetery in 1910, later transferring it to the City in 1996. The Niagara Falls Museums have offered tours of the graveyard the last several Octobers, but the new schedule doesn’t appear online yet. One can assume that there will also be events to celebrate the 200th anniversary of the battle next July, but that information hasn’t been posted yet either. Keep checking here: http://www.niagarafallsmuseums.ca.

In the meantime, the Drummond Hill Cemetery provides a pleasant distraction from the estimated 13 million people who visit Niagara Falls each year. In addition to a variety of monuments to the battle, the cemetery contains several interesting pioneer graves, marked with bronze plaques, and a nice selection of marble gravestones with Victorian mourning reliefs. Even the more modern granite grave markers have lovely decorations. The cemetery is alive with black squirrels and birds. Even though you can still see the Skylon Tower overlooking the falls, the graveyard feels like it’s a world away.

I’d like to thank Mickie and Chad, our servers at the Elements on the Falls restaurant who encouraged me to visit the cemetery. I’d also like to thank my parents and daughter, who spared me for a couple of hours so I could poke around the cemetery while they enjoyed the hotel pool. Any vacation wouldn’t be complete without a cemetery visit.

Useful links:

The City of Niagara Falls homepage for the cemetery and battlefield

PDF walking tour of the Battle of Lundy’s Lane

Battlefields of the War of 1812 tour

Stories of some of the pioneers buried in Drummond Hill Cemetery

Niagara’s Most Haunted

In Search of Ghosts in Drummond Hill Cemetery:

SpiritSeekers re-enacts the hauntings

Cemetery of the Week #17: Sleepy Hollow Cemetery

Letty Lent’s gravestone

Sleepy Hollow Cemetery
540 North Broadway
Sleepy Hollow, New York 10591
Telephone: (914) 631-0081
info@sleepyhollowcemetery.org
Founded: 1849 as Tarrytown Cemetery
Size: 90 acres
Number of interments: 45,000
Open: Monday through Friday 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., Saturday and Sunday 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.

The village of Sleepy Hollow celebrates its famed Headless Horseman on its police cars and with banners on every lamppost. According to The Legend of Sleepy Hollow, the Horseman haunted the Old Dutch Burying Ground, which dates to the 17th century. That graveyard will be the subject of another Cemetery of the Week column. Today I want to talk about the newer Sleepy Hollow Cemetery, which wraps around the Old Dutch Burying Ground.

This weekend, Sleepy Hollow Cemetery is offering tours on Sunday, May 29, and on Monday, May 30 (Memorial Day), both at 2 p.m. The tour costs $19.99 per person and advance reservations required. Here’s the link.

For braver souls, there’s also an evening lantern tour on Sunday, May 29, from 8 p.m. until 10. That costs $24.99. Additional tour dates and more information are listed at http://sleepyhollowcemetery.org/news-events/.

They also offer occasional photography workshops in the cemetery.

If you’re interested in doing a short self-guided tour, the cemetery offers free legal-sized maps featuring eight major figures buried there, including Washington Irving, Andrew Carnegie, Walter Chrysler, and Elizabeth Arden. You can get a copy from the cemetery office or from the literature box at the cemetery’s south gate, adjacent to the Old Dutch Church. They also sell a larger full-color map highlighting more than 50 features of the cemetery. Those maps are available for purchase at the Philipsburg Manor museum shop, across the street from the cemetery’s south gate.

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Sleepy Hollow Cemetery is a lush, gorgeous “rural” cemetery in the fashion of London’s Highgate and Brooklyn’s Greenwood. It is a wonderful place to wander on a spring day.

Walking up the hill from the parking lot between the Old Dutch Church and the Pocantico River, you’ll find the author of the Legend responsible for Sleepy Hollow’s renown. Just shy of the crest of the hill, Washington Irving rests inside a simple iron gate emblazoned with his family name. A plain marble tablet, streaked green with lichen, marks his grave. According to a bronze plaque placed in 1972 by remaining members of the Irving family, the “graveplot” is now a national historic landmark. When I visited, the American Legion had placed an American flag on Irving’s grave to pick it out from all the others, which I appreciated, since the plot’s gate was locked. Irving served in the New York Militia in the War of 1812, but never saw action. Bluebells brighten the grass between the graves.

I found the Sleepy Hollow Cemetery incredibly peaceful. The traffic’s quiet hiss on Route 9 counter-pointed the singing birds. Although I couldn’t see them from the churchyard, lilacs perfumed the air.

I saw no indication that the headless horseman writhed restlessly beneath the sod. In fact, life seemed to be in full force, from spiders winding strands across the ancient stones to squirrels chasing each other up and down the stolid elms. Violets flecked the grass, visited by humming bees. Somewhere near the Pocantico River, a woodpecker knocked on a tree.

While Sleepy Hollow Cemetery holds its share of famous or notable historic figures, the historic unknowns captivated me more. Snowy white flowers adorned a bush growing atop the grave of Letty Lent, the thirteen-year-old wife of “Capt.” Isaac Lent. Born on Christmas Eve 1806, the poor girl had already been married by August 1819, when she passed away. I wondered if she’d spoken her vows in the nearby church.

The cemetery has featured in several notable films and videos. Several outdoor scenes from the 1970 movie House of Dark Shadows (spun off from the hit 1960s vampire soap opera Dark Shadows) were filmed at the cemetery’s receiving vault. I’d link to the trailer, but the cheese factor is too high.

In January 1989, the Ramones were buried—alive—in Sleepy Hollow Cemetery for their Pet Sematary video. None of the deceased Ramones are buried there now.

Useful links:

Sleepy Hollow Cemetery homepage

GPS information from CemeteryRegistry.us

My review of Permanent New Yorkers