Revolutionary War Cemetery
The Revolutionary War Cemetery , also known as Old Salem Burying Ground is known, is a cemetery at the Archibald Street, just off the New York State Route 22 in Salem , New York in the United States . It is an area of 1.1 hectares with more than a thousand graves, at least 100 of which are of veterans of the American Revolutionary War .
The cemetery was established before the War of Independence, but became the burial place for victims of that war when around one hundred dead were buried here in a mass grave after the Battle of Saratoga , which took place nearby . This cemetery is home to more Revolutionary Warfare soldiers than any other cemetery in Washington County , possibly in the state . The cemetery suffered neglect for a number of years, but since its entry on the National Register of Historic Places in 2003, the decline has slowly been reversed.
Area
The cemetery extends southwest on the south side of Archibald Street. It has an almost rectangular area, which is surrounded by a wall made of slate . This is about one meter high and 75 cm thick. There is farmland on the south side. The surrounding area consists of apartment buildings, the houses across the street are small. From the cemetery area you can see the surrounding hilly landscape, the cemetery itself is flat, but there are some burial mounds . On the north side, the cemetery borders the Salem Historic District .
At the main entrance to the cemetery, which consists of two wrought iron gates - one for pedestrians and one for vehicles - two signs are attached to pillars made of granite . In one, it is a two-sided obelisk made of marble , whose inscription honors the veterans buried here and the fact that it indicates in 1933 jointly by the Town was set up and the state. It is considered to have historically contributed to the site. The other sign is a blue and yellow plaque similar to those put up by the state. This was set up by the Village in 1962 .
A wide path leads across the cemetery. Erf passes a group of family barrows and reaches the main area of the cemetery where many marble tombstones are placed. Most of them face east, reflecting the preferred orientation for graves in the 18th century. The exact number was not known until a 1954 Daughters of the American Revolution count found the number of graves from 1769 to 1923 to be 1,040. In 1998 another count was made and 58 more graves were found, making a total of 1098 graves in the cemetery.
There are a few tombstones at the base of the grave and 10 slate tombstones, but the majority of the tombstones are customary tombstones. The oldest graves are scattered along the north side, including three made of red sandstone , a rare material found in an 18th-century Washington County cemetery. Many of the tombstones are unusually worked.
history
The cemetery was founded a few years after Salem was settled. Salem was settled by an immigrant from Massachusetts and religious refugees from Ireland. The first recorded burial is that of Solomon Barr in 1767, the year the cemetery was formally established. Local legend reports that an unknown Indian who came to the settlement and died was the next to be buried in the cemetery. The oldest existing tombstone is that of Abram Savage, who died in 1769 at the age of 18.
Many of the early burials in the cemetery included people of regional historical importance, such as James Turner, whose family owned large estates, Joshua Conkey and his wife Dinah, who were both present at the Battle of Bennington nearby, and St. John Honeywood , a graduate of Yale University and second principal of the local school. Honeywood was also a poet and painter, and his version of Darby and Joan is still included in anthologies today .
Most of the local men buried in the cemetery who died during the Revolutionary War were members of the White Creek Militia , which later became part of the Continental Army . In addition to the battles of Bennington and Saratoga, some were involved in fighting further away from home, such as the Battle of Monmouth . About a hundred names of veterans are known. If the statement proves correct that the mass grave set up after the Battle of Saratoga contained around one hundred dead, the cemetery is one of the largest cemeteries of soldiers from the Revolutionary War in the United States.
Local stonemason Zeruabel Collins created at least 36 of the tombstones in the cemetery, including Savage, the first to be buried. His early cemetery art is similar to that of his father, who did the same job. Later tombstones, however, show his own style, the motifs of which can be characterized by a deeply cut face and protruding chin as well as wings that spread out from it. The motif is usually positioned above an intertwined, snail-like flower motif.
The turf-covered burial mounds are also unusual. These are possibly based on a custom brought from Scotland or Ireland by the settlers there. These consist of dry-laid slate stones and have an east-facing Roman arch, which is sealed with stones and closed with an iron gate.
In 1791, the town created a committee made up of members of the two Presbyterian parishes of Salems to administer the cemetery, employ a guard and build a fence to prevent gravestone theft and illegal burials. It looks like the latter didn't happen until 1870, when the necessary money was available. Thirty years later, in 1821, the oldest deceased in the history of the cemetery, John McNish, who died at the age of 104, was buried. Almost four decades later, a new park-like cemetery was opened west of the village and the number of new burials in the Revolutionary War Cemetery has decreased. After 1898 there was only one funeral left, that of John Gillis in 1923, which was carried out with special permission.
In 1999 the Salem Cemetery Committee was established to restore both the Revolutionary War Cemetery and two other cemeteries in the Town of Salem and to take care of the necessary issues. The committee took photos of all of the tombstones and found that half of them had fallen over or were in danger. Others were overgrown and dug into the ground. A lightning strike later damaged part of the wall.
See also
Web links
- Cemetery page on the Town of Salem website
- Revolutionary War Cemetery @ FindAGrave.com (English)
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b c Revolutionary War Cemetery . Town of Salem, New York . 2008. Archived from the original on May 11, 2010. Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Retrieved April 20, 2010.
- ^ A b c d e Al Cormier: National Register of Historic Places nomination, Revolutionary War Cemetery ( English ) New York State Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation . October 20, 2003. Retrieved April 20, 2010.
Coordinates: 43 ° 10 ′ 1 ″ N , 73 ° 19 ′ 46 ″ W.