Grave Matters

Florida cemetery reveals man behind today's Drury High School in North Adams

2010-09-02T02:22:38Z

Editor's note: This is the last in a summer-long series in which Advocate writer Judith Fairweather visits old cemeteries to try to dig up interesting tidbits of local history.

FLORIDA -- As I pondered my last Grave Matters column of the year, I found it only appropriate to bridge my time between my Advocate summer writing season with my return to my Drury High School classroom by finding the grave of Nathan Drury, founder of DHS.
Using the Berkshire Family History Association computerized Berkshire Index search tool in the local history department at the Berkshire Athenaeum in Pittsfield, I searched for both Nathan and his wife, Freelove, who are buried in the small Drury graveyard located on what was once their property in Florida.

]]> In 1796, Nathan, who was born March 20, 1773, came to settle in the town of Florida from Temple, N.H. The first settler of Florida was Dr. Daniel Nelson, who arrived in approximately 1783, making Nathan one of the earliest settlers of the town.
According to "Over Pathways of the Past: Familiar Features of Our Valley -- How They Originated -- What Happened Along the Way" written by William B. Browne and published in the Transcript from Jan. 8 to May 28, 1938, Nathan "became a very large property owner and accumulated a modest fortune. He lived in the farmhouse still standing in the Drury District and is buried in the family burial lot near the house." Note this ran in 1938. I am unsure whether that farmhouse still stands in 2010.
Nathan lived there with his wife, Freelove, who was born in 1771. She received her own mention in "Forging of a New Mill Town: North and South Adams Massachusetts 1780-1860" written by Timothy Christopher Coogan in 1992. In discussing the changeover from a home-based to an industrial economy, Coogan cited the Berkshire American newspaper of North Village, which reported in the 1820s that Freelove, "wife of a prominent figure in educational reform in North Adams Š had done an enormous amount of domestic manufacturing in one year. Besides spinning and picking wool, she had 'hatcheled, carded and spun' 89 'runs' of tow and linen yarn.
"In addition to this she 'doubled and twisted 10 runs of yarn; spooled and quilled 237 runs; whitened 56 yards of cloth; knit 5 pairs of socks, 3 1/2 pair of stockings, and 4 pair of mittens; made 13 shirts, 4 pair of pillow-cases, 3 sheets, and 40 meal-bags.'"
Not much else could be found on either Nathan or Freelove, with the exception of two cards in the Shepard Card File, Florida, Mass., at the library. The librarian explained that these cards hold all sorts of vital statistics. The yellowing, brittle card I pulled out of the old-fashioned wooden card catalog drawer -- remember when we had to look up our books using the wooden drawers containing cards? -- with Freelove's name on it only said that Clarissa Hawks, born 1827, "lives with her," with another notation that was difficult to read. It looked like 1850 census, which would make sense, since Freelove died Jan. 15, 1851, at the age of 80. Perhaps Clarissa was her caregiver in the final years of her life.
Nathan's card contained the bequests in his will. Dated the day of his death (June 8, 1840), the card said Nathan had left Freelove the "home, furniture, livestock, $3,000 and resid." I can only surmise the last word was "residuals," meaning anything left over.
In addition, he left $1,000 to his nephew, Thomas H. Drury (Nathan and Freelove had no children); $1,000 to Mount Holyoke Fem. Instit. [sic], which was actually called Mount Holyoke Female Seminary, chartered as a teaching seminary in 1837 and the precursor to Mount Holyoke College; and $3,000 to establish Drury Academy. He also made bequests to his sisters Patty and Sally in the amounts of $10 and $5, respectively.
The writing on the card indicated the will was appealed by Patty and Sally on June 7, 1841. Also included were the following notations: RE 4925 and P 30,605. I theorize this might mean his real estate was valued at $4,925, and his property (cash and anything other than real estate) was worth more than $30,000. No wonder Patty and Sally were irritated.
In 1843, Drury Academy was built with that bequest of Nathan Drury. It was transformed into a free public high school in 1851. In 1867, the original building was torn down and replaced with a larger one. This building still exists as the home of the North Adams Public Schools administrative offices and the site of the now-closed Silvio O. Conte Middle School.
Our current building on South Church Street was built in 1976 during the open classrooms craze, but was renovated in 2001 to remake the school with traditional classrooms with walls -- thank God -- and update the electronic technology.
I approached the graves of Nathan and Freelove Drury with my usual reverence, but unlike all my other visits, I couldn't give them my undivided attention. The graveyard, off South County Road in Florida and marked with a beautiful sign, sits steps away from a pasture that was filled with cows. As the daughter of a retired small-animal veterinarian, I know a lot about many types of animals, but cows, not so much. As I approached the fenced-in plot, a massive cow lifted its head from its grazing and focused its unswerving gaze on me. A bit unnerved, despite the fact the pasture was surrounded by an electric fence, I kept one eye on the cow and the other on my work.
On the way home from my adventure, I stopped for a fabulous meal at the Golden Eagle Restaurant on the hairpin turn of Route 2. While I snapped pictures of the gorgeous sunset over the hills to the west, I offered up a silent thank you to Nathan Drury for his philanthropy. His bequest led to the creation of my school and thus to my place in the ranks of the DHS family. Honey, I'm home!

Until she once again dusts off her investigator's hat, you can read Judith Fairweather's education column, Time for Teacher, every third Thursday of the month. E-mail her at jfairweather@advocateweekly.com.

Lanesborough cemetery shows the scourge of smallpox

2010-08-23T15:53:08Z

Editor's note: This is the fourth in a summer-long series in which Advocate writer Judith Fairweather visits old cemeteries to try to dig up interesting tidbits of local history. Read all of her columns at blogtheberkshires.com.

By JUDITH FAIRWEATHER
LANESBOROUGH -- While serving as assistant editor of The Advocate, I traveled two routes to get to the North Adams office from my Pittsfield home, one of which took me up Route 7 to Summer Street, from where I hopped onto Old Cheshire Road and then to Route 8.
This route took me right past an old cemetery in Lanesborough. Every time I went by, I wondered about the old stones I saw and about the stories of the people buried there. Thus, the Center Cemetery, as it is now called, was really the impetus for the birth of this Grave Matters column.
I figured it was finally time to investigate the source of my obsession, so I trekked to the local history department of the Berkshire Athenaeum with my trusty Berkshire Family History Association "A Guide to Berkshire County Cemeteries" in hand. I had the good fortune to encounter Rick Leab behind the desk there. When I explained I needed information on Center Cemetery, he replied that he had several family members buried there. A cacophony of joyous bells broke out in my head: Here was someone I could ask firsthand about the cemetery's residents.

]]> Leab is the great-great-great-great-great-great-grandson (yup, six "greats") of Capt. Jabez Hall of Lanesborough. Besides being a soldier, Hall, he said, built three taverns: one on Scott Road, another near the road that leads to Mount Greylock and a third in Dalton.
My investigation into Hall led to a wealth of information. Hall first served in the military in Connecticut, from whence he hailed, during the French and Indian War, even serving as a lieutenant at Fort William Henry in Lake George, N.Y., in the year of its construction in 1755. The fort has been memorialized in James Fenimore Cooper's "The Last of the Mohicans" as the site of a horrific Native American massacre of British and militia troops upon their surrender to the French in 1757.
In about 1769, Hall moved his family from New Fairfield, Conn., to Lanesborough, where he became a prominent citizen, even serving on the town's Committee of Correspondence, according to Leab. The committees were local bodies organized by the governments of the 13 Colonies before the American Revolution and were responsible for disseminating important information. Many members of the Committees of Correspondence would also become members of the secret Sons of Liberty groups.
Hall, referred to as a "Colonial officer of the Crown under King George" by Charles J. Palmer in his "History of the Town of Lanesborough," published in 1905, is said, according to Palmer, to have received "a sudden call in the night for enlistment of a company of Lanesboro men to go to Canada and fight."
What is referenced here is the first American offensive of the American Revolution in September 1775. The American forces planned to take first Montreal and then Quebec from the British, but all would not go as planned. In Palmer's history, he relates Hall's call to arms: "Early the next morning the able-bodied men of Lanesboro assembled in front of the old Hall Tavern where Capt. J. came out with a black bottle of rum in each hand. Š Leaping into the air he struck his heels together three times before coming to the top step, also clashing the two bottles together above his head.
"Then he shouted, 'Who goes with me to Canada?' A full company was immediately enlisted, and of its members were his two sons Gershom and John, while Lyman, being about 19 years of age, accompanied his father as valet."
Hall and his sons would join the assault under Brig. Gen. Richard Montgomery. Montreal fell rather easily on Nov. 28. A second force led by Col. Benedict Arnold was to meet up with Montgomery's force for the much more difficult assault on Quebec. The assault began after midnight on Dec. 31, 1775, in a snowstorm. The first volley killed Montgomery and two of his chief underlings. Things went downhill from there. The assault failed.
But it was not yet time for the troops to come home. Arnold attempted to rally them to lay siege to the city, but was foiled by the desertion of his troops as their enlistments expired, a common issue early in the war, and an outbreak of smallpox that swept through the camp. In the midst of this chaos were Hall and his three sons. Although we can't be sure when, at some point during the winter of 1776, Hall was struck by smallpox. He would never return home to be buried by his wife, Hannah.
Lyman, also a smallpox victim, survived to return home to his mother, as did his two brothers. Lyman would go on to receive a commission as lieutenant colonel in the Continental Army, returning to Lanesborough after the war to manage his father's tavern. Lyman died April 25, 1844, at the age of 87, at the home of his son, Gen. Jabez Hall.
In an odd twist of fate, Lyman's mother, Hannah, died on June 8, 1807, just a few days after the May 25 death of Lyman's daughter Hannah. I don't know what caused the deaths, but once again can only presume that perhaps some illness swept through the area and took them both. Smallpox, consumption and cholera are the likely suspects. The younger Hannah's grave bears a somewhat gruesome epitaph: "Young friends behold me/where I lie/and learn from hence/you are born to die."
I leave you now with those words ringing in your ears. There is much, much more to unearth in Center Cemetery. If you dig up something good, be sure to let me know. And give my best to the Halls.

E-mail Advocate writer Judith Fairweather at jfairweather @advocateweekly.com.

Charlemont cemetery tells unique tale of local history

2010-08-14T03:02:10Z

Editor's note: This is the third in a summer-long series in which Advocate writer Judith Fairweather visits old cemeteries to try to dig up interesting tidbits of local history. Read all of her columns at blogtheberkshires.com.

By JUDITH FAIRWEATHER
CHARLEMONT -- Last fall, I received an e-mail from Bea DaSilva inquiring whether my invitations to accompany me on my cemetery quests were literal or not. She had no idea she was someone from my long-ago past, having served as an English teacher at both my junior high (Crosby) and my high school (Taconic).
Thus, I had the chance to reminisce with her about some former teachers on a recent drive over the Mohawk Trail to Charlemont. How lovely. Our mission was to find a graveyard recommended by Advocate Editor Rebecca Dravis, although that was all I knew about it.
But we weren't going to have to investigate this cemetery on our own. We met Joanne MacLean, director of the Charlemont Historical Society Museum, who, even though an eighth-generation resident, had never visited this particular site. We headed to the Zoar Outdoor property right on Route 2, scrambling up a small hill to reach the gravesite of Capt. Rice, his family and Phineas Arms. Rice and Arms were killed in an attack by Native Americans on June 11, 1755, on the site.

]]> In order to understand the story, we need to travel back in time to the settlement of North America by the French and English in the 17th century. Each culture had its own reasons for colonization. The French were after resources and wealth, such as could be found in the fur trade; the English wanted land.
This race for conquest would inevitably lead to conflict. Caught in the middle were the Native Americans. In the East, squeezed between the French who settled Canada and the English in the Northeast, was the Abenaki tribe, a subdivision of the Algonquian nation of northeastern North America. Continued settlement by the English would prompt the French to seek alliances with the Indians, including one with the Abenaki.
As tensions rose between the French and the English, a series of conflicts broke out between them beginning in 1689. The last of these is called the French and Indian War (1754-1763).
The infamous Deerfield Massacre occurred on Feb. 29, 1704, during one of these conflicts known as Queen Anne's War (1702-1713). During the attack of French and Native American forces, the settlement was razed, 56 men, women and children Colonists were killed, and 109 others were taken captive.
The English could be savage, too. During Drummer's War (1721-1725), in which the French allied with the Abenaki, asking them to raid English settlements, the Massachusetts Bay Colony set a bounty of about $20,000 today for each Native American scalp obtained. Grey Lock, an Abenaki chief, led these raids.
Capt. Moses Rice came to Charlemont in the fall of 1742. Rice, born in 1694, had grown up with these conflicts. In Charlemont, he began establishing himself as a farmer. He soon built his own grist mill, which in 1745 was grinding corn for Fort Massachusetts in North Adams.
In 1746, Rice, for unknown reasons, sent his family away to Old Deerfield. In that same week, Fort Massachusetts was overtaken by French and Native American forces. When Rice finally returned to his home, he found it burnt to the ground, his cattle and hogs killed and his grain destroyed.
Rather than rebuilding, Rice took his family east to Rutland, Mass., where they stayed for three years. He was a determined man, however. The year after another French and Indian conflict ended (King George's War, 1744-1748), Rice returned to Charlemont with his family.
There they lived for another six years, until June 11, 1755. Rice was out hoeing corn with one of his grown sons, Artemas; his 9-year-old grandson, Asa; Titus King; and Phineas Arms. In a fabulous book titled "Charlemont, Massachusetts 1765-1965, a Bicentennial History" written by Allan Healy in 1965, it states that a party of six "St. Francis Indians," as the Abenaki were called, ambushed them. Arms, 24, was killed immediately. Rice was badly wounded in the thigh, while King was overpowered and seized. Asa, thrown from his horse, attempted to hide, but also was captured. It was left to Artemas to run down the road 6 miles to sound the alarm.
The women in the adjoining field, hearing the shots, fled up the hill to the fortified Rice house, where, Healy writes, "they watched as the captives were taken to the high plain behind the fort (Rice's house). Here Rice was left scalped and bleeding." He died later that night.
But the Rices and other families that had begun to settle Charlemont were made of sturdy stock. Despite the tragedy, they stayed. And once the final French and Indian War concluded in 1763, settlers poured into the western portion of Massachusetts.
But this story cannot be complete without including the story of the Abenaki. Before they had contact with Europeans in the 1500s, they may have numbered as many as 40,000. Through devastating armed conflict and diseases such as smallpox, typhus, influenza, diphtheria and even measles, there would be only about 1,000 Abenaki at the end of the American Revolution.
They were thus literally fighting for their very lives when the small war party ambushed Rice and his friends and family. And what of Chief Grey Lock, who led raids in the years prior to this event? On the Abenaki website (abenakination.org/historicalsites.html), it credits the naming of the Berkshires' own Mount Greylock to the fact that the English never defeated him, and the mountain was named for him in acknowledgment of his skill and bravery.
And so, if you decide to venture to Charlemont to climb the hill behind Zoar Outdoor, I would ask you to stop along the way at the Hail to the Sunrise monument right on Route 2. A bronze statue of a Mohawk stands with his arms outstretched to the east, honoring the five Indian nations of the Mohawk Trail. A fountain contains 100 inscribed stones from various tribes and councils from across North America. Spend a moment considering all that they lost in their fight to protect their homes, their women and children, their language and culture and even their scalps. There are always two sides to a story.

E-mail comments to Advocate writer Judith Fairweather at jfairweather@advocateweekly.com.

Hidden history in Hinsdale

2010-07-21T23:21:31Z

Editor's note: This is the second in a summer-long series in which Advocate writer Judith Fairweather visits old cemeteries to try to dig up interesting tidbits of local history. Read all of her columns at blogtheberkshires.com.

HINSDALE -- On a recent sultry day, I was given a private tour of the Morey Cemetery by The Advocate's own Kelly Bevan, features editor.
Accompanied by her daughter, McKenna, and black Lab, Kenai, we braved the dinner-plate-sized horse flies in our three-hour hike to the family plot off the end of New Windsor Road. Well, OK, it wasn't three hours -- more like 20 to 30 minutes -- one way -- but the bugs and humidity made every rock-strewn step along the forest trail feel like a thousand. The promise of a cold drink on Kelly's oasis of a front porch, however, kept pushing us toward our goal.

]]> The graveyard is small, with only six large headstones, four tiny markers bearing initials only and two mostly buried markers. Yet even this little burial ground presented the opportunity to unearth a ton of information, with the help of the Local History Department of the Berkshire Athenaeum in Pittsfield.
A great example is Maryett, wife of Eleazar Cady, who died Aug. 21, 1849, at 22 years old. Maryett represents a pattern I have seen many times: Although listed as the wife of someone, her headstone appears alone in the cemetery. Why is her husband not buried with her?
This time, I may have an answer. In the "Biographical Review of Leading Citizens of Berkshire County, Vol. XXXI," I found an entry for Edward Cady, son of Eleazar and Lucretia Kellogg Cady. The entry says Edward's
Advertisement

father was living in Windsor at the time of Edward's birth but that he was from Hinsdale. Edward was born in 1853, four years after Maryett's death.
From this, I surmise that Eleazar buried his first wife in Hinsdale but then remarried. My theory is that wherever Lucretia, who died in 1895 at the age of 80, is buried, Eleazar can also be found.
Although I couldn't find anything on Maryett, I did learn something about her in-laws. Maryett's grandfather-in-law, also named Eleazar Cady, was a private in the Revolutionary War. One of George Washington's most difficult challenges in leading the Continental Army was the fluid nature of the number of his forces, the members of which joined and left frequently. The senior Cady fits that mold: He saw 16 days of service as a private from July 11 to 27 in 1777 and then enlisted again for 26 days of service from Sept. 6 to Oct. 2, 1777.
The senior Eleazar Cady also typified another period in American history called the Second Great Awakening. This period, which began in the early 1800s in the East and spread westward to the frontier, saw a religious revival of great proportions. In "A History of the County of Berkshire, Massachusetts" published in 1829 and authored "By Gentlemen in the County, Clergymen and Laymen," Cady is credited with being one of the organizers of the Hinsdale Baptist Church and Society in 1797.
During this revival period, new denominations such as the Mormons were born, and Baptists and Methodists saw rapid growth in their congregations. The "History of the County" states that a religious revival in 1818 led to several new Baptist members. It goes on to say there was a second revival in 1821 and a third revival in 1827, "more general and powerful than either of the others." By Jan. 1, 1828, there were 78 members of the Hinsdale Baptist congregation, with 38 of those being Hinsdale residents.
Our Cady, Maryett, was part of yet another piece of American history. According to the Central Pacific Railroad Photographic History Museum (cprr.org/Museum/ RR_ Development.html), from 1830-1840, the number of miles of U.S. railroad lines increased from a mere 23 miles to an astonishing 2,808 miles. In "The Heritage of Hinsdale: An Anthology," Leonard F. Swift, editor, published in 2005, Swift explains that in the 1840s, railroad surveyors chose Hinsdale over South County as the way to extend the line from Springfield westward.
According to the anthology, railroading was not the only occupation in Hinsdale during this period. By the 1830s and '40s, "sheep raising supplemented the earlier subsistence farming." The quality wool was used to supply the mills.
Besides Maryett Cady, there are also a number of Moreys buried there, although I couldn't find the family connection between them. Nathaniel Morey, who died Feb. 16, 1843, at the incredible age of 91, had served as a sergeant in the "Massachusetts line" during the American Revolution and was given a pension for said service on June 30, 1818.
His wife, Susannah, lies next to him. She passed on Dec. 15, 1841, at the age of 92. Their daughter, whose name is spelled Susanna, is also there.
This spelling points out another common theme in my wanderings: misspellings on headstones. On daughter Susanna's stone, her mother's name is also spelled without the "h" at the end. The dates here indicate that Susannah the senior gave birth to her daughter when she was 38 -- an incredible age for the time.
The search for information about another Morey buried there -- Thomas, who died Feb. 17, 1869, at the age of 84 -- revealed some other information about the Hinsdale of the time. In the 1855 census, Thomas was listed as a farmer. Other occupations of Hinsdale residents included, of all things, a pauper, Eliza Roberts, age 37, as well as carpenters, cabinet- and boot-makers, laborers, a wool sorter, two doctors and a blacksmith, among others.
Before our departure from the Morey Cemetery, I will leave you with the mystery of Deacon Joel Redway, who died July 1, 1837, at 81, who lies next to his wife, Lucinda, who died Oct. 25, 1856, at age 75. Redway, it seems, was chosen as a deacon of the Lanesborough Baptist Church on July 13, 1822. The church was dedicated on Feb. 10, 1819, again smack-dab in the middle of the Second Great Awakening. But how did the Redways wind up in Hinsdale? I have no idea. If you find out, make sure to let me know.

E-mail comments to Advocate writer Judith Fairweather at
jfairweather@advocateweekly.com.

Pettibone Cemetery offers more questions than answers

2010-07-01T01:27:52Z

Editor's note: This is the first in a summer-long series in which Advocate writer Judith Fairweather visits old cemeteries to try to dig up interesting tidbits of local history. Read all of her columns at blogtheberkshires.com.

By JUDITH FAIRWEATHER
LANESBOROUGH -- Now that I have successfully navigated my first year in a classroom after a nine-year absence, it's time to pack away my teacher hat along with my lesson plans and dig out my Advocate reporter hat and notebook.
Of course, the first thing on my agenda was the resurrection of my "Grave Matters" column. How lovely it was to be skulking around a graveyard again, trying to decipher vanishing inscriptions from ancient marble headstones while trying to make connections or draw conclusions about the people buried there.
My first stop this summer was at the Pettibone Cemetery on Old Cheshire Road, right on the Lanesborough/Cheshire line. I chose that one because my dad has driven by it for years and wanted to know about it. Interestingly, it's also one of the two routes I take to get to Drury, yet I never even noticed it until I went searching for it last week.
It is a small cemetery, with maybe 30 or so stones, tops. As always, the stones that drew me were those of the children. The Porter family experienced great tragedy in a short period of time. Sumner Porter, son of Philip and Martha Porter, died Oct. 18, 1832, at 18 months old. In 1832 there was a massive cholera outbreak that started in North America in Montreal in June and quickly worked its way down to New York. Was Sumner a cholera victim, perhaps?

]]> Just a short six years later, the Porters would experience a double tragedy. Their son Charles, 4, would die on April 23, 1838, while another son, Sylvester, 5, would die four days later. Again, was this the result of an outbreak of illness? In addition to cholera, "consumption," or tuberculosis, as well as smallpox were responsible for many childhood deaths in the early part of the 19th century.
To try and discover if there had been some recorded outbreak of illness in 1838, I read through the April 1838 editions of the Pittsfield Sun. I came up empty-handed. There were two items that caught my eye, however. The first was a national news piece from the April 26 edition: The wife and two children of Aneel D. Glass, living near Lyne, Mich., were found murdered in their home. The article said, "The marks of blood and slaughter indicate that it was perpetuated by the Indians." It was theorized that Glass had been carried off and murdered.
This piece struck me because several months later, in the winter of 1838, President Andrew Jackson would order the relocation of the Cherokee of Georgia, a journey known as the Trail of Tears. This tiny article clearly showed how U.S. attitudes could allow such a crime. Shameful.
I also saw an advertisement by Lorenzo Kellogg, who was looking for "5 or 6 female weavers" for the Green River Manufactory near Great Barrington, "to whom liberal wages will be paid." The first power looms, a vital step in the American Industrial Revolution, had been installed in Uxbridge in 1820. Clearly, manufacturing had migrated to the Berkshires by the 1830s.
But I digress. Back to the Porters: There was a baby, Cordelia, who would survive whatever had taken her brothers in 1838, but her victory was short-lived. Cordelia would die at age 4 on April 11, 1841.
The family then experienced a period of relative calm, until the close of the Civil War. On June 18, 1865, 18-year-old Nelson passed. Try as I might, I could not find any record that Nelson had served in the Civil War. Robert E. Lee surrendered to Ulysses S. Grant at Appomattox Courthouse on April 9, 1865, so it is certainly possible that Nelson could have died of battle wounds a few months later, but I could not determine if this was so.
In stark contrast to the Porters, the Pettibones buried there were extremely long-lived, although the first Pettibone headstone I came to presented a challenge. It was the marker for Daniel Pettibone, who died Dec. 26, 1848, at 51 years old. There was an epitaph -- my favorite! -- but much of it was illegible. Putting my 11-year-old, Caroline, to work, I had her dig through the car to find a crayon so we could do a rubbing of it. While she puzzled over the letters, I continued my research. We ultimately came up with the following, although I cannot guarantee that we were correct in our interpretation: "The dying moment is at hand/thy grace oh Lord is above/that I may boast at thy command/the victory o'er the grave."
Daniel would be one of the youngest members I found. Others included Lucy, wife of Philo, who died in 1835 at age 65; Jonathan, who was 92 when he died in 1821; Mary, Jonathan's wife, who was 73 when she died in 1813; and Amos, who died in 1850 at more than 89 years old. What a difference!
So my first stop this summer unearthed young deaths and ancient deaths and also prompted me to get sidetracked by my visit to the Berkshire Athenaeum's Local History department. No surprise there. My next stop is planned for a cemetery in Hinsdale, with the tour provided by The Advocate's own Kelly Bevan. Dust off your history books and come on along!

Shakers had unique cemetery traditions

2009-10-14T19:45:15Z

Editor's note: This is the last in a summer-long series in which Advocate writer Judith Fairweather visits old cemeteries to try to dig up interesting tidbits of local history. Read all of her columns online at blogtheberkshires.com.

By JUDITH FAIRWEATHER
NEW LEBANON, N.Y. - In Berkshire County, when the term Shakers is used, I would say it was a safe bet that most people would picture Hancock Shaker Village.
But Hancock was not the only local Shaker community. In fact, the Mount Lebanon home of the United Society of Believers in Christ's Second Appearing was the largest and most successful communal utopian society for 160 years, from 1787 to 1947. As with other Shaker communities, the village was divided into several unique "family" groupings, variously named the Church Family, the North Family, the South Family and so on.
Currently, Darrow School is housed on the Church and Center family properties; the North Family acreage, however, was purchased by the Shaker Museum and Library in 2004 as the future home of the museum.
The museum is being relocated there from its current Old Chatham site bit by bit, according to Jerry Grant, the museum's director of research and library services. In order to give the public a glimpse into the life of the Mount Lebanon Shakers, this summer the museum held a series of "Talk and Walk" lecture tours. The last in the series will be held Saturday, Oct. 17, at 10 a.m.

]]> Grant generously braved the cold October wind on Columbus Day weekend to give me a sneak peek of what tour-goers can expect at the "Hidden Treasures of Mount Lebanon: The Cemeteries" event for this column, my last "Grave Matters." It is not yet set in stone - pun intended - but will depend on the weather and the group size. It will, however, start with a half-hour presentation on Shaker dying and death and burial customs, Grant said, addressing the ongoing debates the Shakers had about cemeteries and graveyards.
One option, Grant said, is to then walk up to the North and Church families' burial site, where there is one communal marker. He may then possibly take the group to the old cemetery, where there is one main marker as well as some individual markers. The site, however, is badly overgrown, and it is hard to see much there. If the group is small enough, he added, he might encourage a road trip to the Canaan Shaker burial site, which has individual stones.
Grant started my tour in the North Family's granary building so that he could give me a summary of Shaker beliefs out of the reach of the chilly wind. Before heading off to the burial site, it was important that I understand what I was about to see, and why. "There are two main points," he said. "The Shakers don't believe in the resurrection of the body, so when you don't need the body, what do you do with the body?
"The ongoing argument for them was if you bury it with some procedure and dignity, the issue is, do you mark the spot, or leave it unmarked, as you would the place where you would bury a dead horse?"
The Ministry - the decision-making body of the Shakers - finally decided in the 1870s that it should be marked, but in synch with Shaker beliefs, meaning that the marking should be simple and communal.
"The second dilemma, in a society of declining numbers, is how do you maintain them?" he said. Native stone degrades quickly. Writing also degrades, so how much should be written on the stones? "In the 1870s, the decision was made that you could use stone or cast iron markers. Here - at the North and Church families - and Harvard were the only ones to use cast iron," he said.
Requirements also were passed that detailed how high a stone could project above and below the ground and what could be written on it. At Mount Lebanon, that meant only the name, age at death and date of death. There would be no epitaphs for these stones.
But once those questions had been settled, the question still remained, given the ever-accelerating decline in membership, of how to maintain them. "They were encouraged to pull up individual markers and install single markers," he said.
And what happened to those individual markers? They ended up as convenient pieces of stone, used for basement floors, walkways and the like. Some were just stacked up behind cemetery walls; those in Enfield, Conn., were crushed and made into the single marker that now exists, he said.
But not all Shaker communities removed the individual stones. Some communities brokered deals with their various surrounding communities to care for the graveyards, he added.
Before heading out to see the single monument marking the third graveyard of the North and Church families, reached by following a short trail in the woods - it's a bit of a hike, even in good shoes - Grant wanted to show me something in the Brethren's Workshop and Wash House. There, scrawled on the wall, was a drawing of a coffin, Dracula-shaped. Grant pointed out the rectangle drawn inside the coffin shape. That, he said, was most likely a window of glass, so that viewers could look into the coffin to see the face of the deceased.
The graveyard is very peaceful, although somewhat disconcerting without individual stones. The individual graves were recorded, however, Grant said.
"They measured out and staked out where the graves were," he said. "There is a plot plan. I have one on a piece of paper, and one scrawled on the back of a seed box."
But even though I was unable in this last column to make my connections with the long-departed in the way I usually do, I was able to solve a mystery after all. I inquired whether Grant knew of a grave on Lebanon Mountain, a grave that people have told me belonged to someone on the Titanic or the S.S. Lusitania. Turns out it's the latter, and turns out that Grant was able to give me explicit directions to finally find it.
The small burial site, located in a stand of pine trees on the left as one heads toward New York over the mountain, belongs to the Bates family. Lindon and Josephine Bates purchased 500 acres to 600 acres from the Mount Lebanon Shakers, intending to build a home there. However, after their son, Lindon Jr., was killed May 7, 1915 - along with 127 additional Americans and 1,070 others, including children, when the Cunard passenger liner was torpedoed by a German U-boat off the coast of Ireland - they abandoned the building project. The small family graveyard surrounded by a black fence bears a monument to their fallen son. It is unlikely that Lindon Jr. actually rests there, as fewer than 300 bodies were recovered, some of which never were identified.
And thus a mystery that has plagued me for some time finally has been put to rest, much like this column for the season. Thank you for keeping me company on this adventure. I certainly hope to revive it next year so that together we can unearth some more interesting tales of our Berkshire County ancestors. So pack away your detective hats and notebooks, but keep them handy. I'll be counting the days until we can get back to our investigations.

"Hidden Treasures of Mount Lebanon: The Cemeteries" will take place Saturday, Oct. 17, at 10 a.m. at Mount Lebanon Shaker Village in New Lebanon, N.Y. The cost is $15, or $10 for museum members. Reservations are recommended. Info: 518-794-9100, ext. 220, or miller@shakermuseumandlibrary.org.
Advocate writer Judith Fairweather can be reached at jfairweather@advocateweekly.com.

It's all in the name at Washington Town Cemetery

2009-09-23T18:20:00Z

By JUDITH FAIRWEATHER
WASHINGTON - Juliet once asked, "What's in a name?" Well, if your name is Dorcas and you lived in the town of Washington, apparently everything.
But we'll get to that in a minute.
When I was talking about this column back in May with my good friend George Bodnar, who lives with his wife, Cindy, across the street from my parents in Pittsfield, George said he had a cemetery I simply had to visit in October Mountain State Forest.

]]> One drippy Sunday afternoon, we headed out in his Jeep, armed with his walking stick and GPS. George turned off Washington Mountain Road just before the Washington Town Offices building and crossed what he referred to as the "four corners." On our way to the cemetery in the woods, he explained that the 16,500 acres of the state forest had been established by William C. Whitney, President Grover Cleveland's secretary of the Navy. Whitney, he said, had started building a game preserve, but "after his wife died, he had no interest in coming here." He abandoned the game preserve, the animals left behind to incorporate themselves into the wilderness.
After parking, we followed a marked trail a short distance into the woods. Suddenly, in a small clearing, we came upon the tiny graveyard. George was surprised to see that since his last visit, which had admittedly been some time ago, a typed list of the cemetery's occupants had been nailed to a tree, protected by a plastic sleeve. The papers said "October Mountain Cemetery, transcribed by Arthur Stringer of Lee," at the top, and then listed each person by name with date of death, age and spouse, if applicable. What a surprising, wonderful help!
Anna Pease, 10 years and 9 months old, who died Jan. 22, 1829, was the oldest grave to be found. The majority of her companions, however, died in the 1840s and '50s.
True to the era, many of the stones bore epitaphs, like that of Allice Sanger, wife of Daniel, who died Jan. 5, 1842, whose stone read: "Go home dear friends,/dry up your tears/I wilst lie here/till Christ appears."
However, what I didn't find in this particular cemetery were the interesting stories I can usually infer from births and dates of death. That was left for our spur-of-the-moment stop at the cemetery adjacent to the Washington Town Offices. That's where our Dorcas, or I should say our Dorcases, come in.
Toward the rear of the cemetery, I came upon a line of stones by themselves. On the left was the grave of Dorcas, wife of Eurola Thorp, who died Jan. 12, 1829. Immediately to her right was the grave of Dorcas M., daughter of Eurola and Dorcas Thorp, who died Oct. 17, 1826, at 1 year old. It occurred to me, as I looked at mother and daughter, that although the convention of naming a son for his father continues today, I have seen many daughters named for their mothers during my cemetery jaunts, a not-so-common practice today.
I moved to the right a bit, and then my brow furrowed in puzzlement. There were five more graves there: Miranda E., Henry D., Mary E. and Joseph E., children of David and Dorcas P. Thorp. At the end of the line, I found Dorcas P. herself, who died, as best as I could read, Oct. 31, 1851, at age 36.
Wait - two Dorcases, with a daughter Dorcas as well? I went over and over it, trying to figure it out. Finally it dawned on me - two women named Dorcas had probably married brothers. What are the chances that two women in the town of Washington would be named Dorcas?
Actually, according to the Social Security Administration Web site (ssa.gov), the chances were better than if they were named Judith, a name I consider to be "old." The SSA's site lists the top 1,000 names by year. In 1880, the first year listed, Dorcas was 521 on the list, while Judith was only 882. Dorcas remains in the top 1,000 until falling off the list in 1956, never to reappear.
But Dorcas was not the only popular name in Washington, apparently. George and I also discovered another mystery - that of the Elizabeths. Elizabeth, wife of Alonzo B. Messenger, died June 6, 1853, at age 33. Elizabeth, wife of Alonzo B. Messenger, died Aug. 25, 1855, at age 29. No, that's not a typo. Apparently, Alonzo had two wives, both named Elizabeth, who died a scant two years apart. At least he wouldn't have had trouble remembering his second wife's name .
Probably the most touching grave George and I found there was that of Benjamin, son of Edwin and Eleanor Neumuth, who died Jan. 16, 1978, at only 4 days old. In a return to traditions past, Benjamin's stone bears an epitaph: "Heaven has gained another treasure/Earth the lowly casket keeps/and the birds will love to linger/where our darling Benjamin sleeps."
George and I left the cemetery pondering one final mystery, that of two Sallys, both gone too soon. Sally Harritt, daughter of George and Sally Smith, died Aug. 30, 1796, at 3 years old. Sally Smith, her mother, died Sept. 4, 1796, at 26 years. Thus, the young mother died only five days after her little girl. Was it an illness that swept through, causing a young man to lose his family in the blink of an eye? It is always these situations that seem to call to me.
I hope to have one final installation of Grave Matters this season, and would love for you to accompany me. Don't forget your detective hats!

Judith Fairweather can be reached at jfairweather@advocateweekly.com or 413-663-7942, ext. 234.

Indians, slaves, veterans - Stockbridge Cemetery has 'em

2009-08-20T13:01:34Z

Grave Matters: Indians, slaves, veterans - Stockbridge Cemetery has 'em

Editor's note: This is the fifth in a summer-long series in which Advocate Assistant Editor Judith Fairweather visits old cemeteries to try to dig up interesting tidbits of local history. Read all of her columns at blogtheberkshires.com.

By Judith Fairweather
STOCKBRIDGE - When I made the decision to visit the Stockbridge Cemetery, I knew it would have to be a different type of column. I was going to need some serious experts.
So I turned to the Trustees of Reservations, the main office of which is on Sergeant Street just behind the Mission House. I had a specific agenda in mind. I wanted to visit the grave of Mum Bett, who came to be known as Elizabeth Freeman, in advance of the celebration of the 228th anniversary of her court victory on Aug. 21, 1781, which established an important precedent that would lead to the abolishment of slavery in Massachusetts. Since 2006, the Trustees have celebrated that event with a program at the home of her once-master, Col. John Ashley, in Sheffield. This year's event will be held Friday, Aug. 21, with an open house at noon and the program at 2 p.m.

]]> Will Garrison, the Trustees' historic resources manager, was amenable to giving me a tour of the cemetery so that I could visit Mum Bett as well as other notable residents there.
We started with the grave of the Rev. John Sergeant, the first missionary to the Stockbridge Mahicans. Sergeant died in 1749, at the age of 39, 10 years after the construction of the Mission House. He was succeeded in 1750 by Jonathon Edwards, who had experienced a falling out with his congregation in Northampton.
The oldest corner of the cemetery also contains a marker in memory of John Konkapot, one of the Stockbridge Mahicans. Garrison said it is not known if Konkapot is actually buried there or if the stone is simply a memorial.
The next stop on our tour was to the grave of Mary Hopkins, who founded the Laurel Hill Association, the oldest village beautification association in the country, in 1853. Born March 7, 1814, she died on Feb. 12, 1895. Her epitaph reads, "Are they not all ministering spirits."
The cemetery also contains its share of veterans - there are 38 Revolutionary War veterans buried there, according to the town of Stockbridge Web site. I, however, was interested in stopping by the graves of two members of the famed Massachusetts 54th regiment, one of the first official black units formed in the U.S. armed forces led by Col. Robert Gould Shaw. (Shaw, by the way, married Annie Haggerty of Ventfort Hall in nearby Lenox on May 2, 1863. They had three weeks together before he marched out with his troops, never to return home again. He was killed with many of his men during the assault on Fort Wagner on July 18, 1863. His wife never remarried.)
The two soldiers we stopped to visit were Corp. D.H. Van Allen and V.W. Williams. Their simple markers did not provide much information about them, sadly enough.
A trip to the Stockbridge Cemetery would not be complete without a visit to the famous Sedgwick Pie. Garrison said Sedgwick lore has it that the graves are laid out with the patriarch and matriarch, Theodore and Pamela, in the center, with the rest in concentric circles around them, "so on Judgment Day, when they rose, they would see only Sedgwicks," Garrison said, although he added he believes that was a "joke they told on themselves."
There in the Sedgwick Pie stands the grave of Mum Bett, written as Mumbet on the gravestone, next to Catharine Sedgwick. Small stones had been placed across the top of Mum Bett's grave in tribute to her.
Mum Bett (c. 1744-1829) was a slave of Col. John Ashley's family in Sheffield. According to tradition, Mum Bett heard the discussions that took place in regard to the drafting of the Massachusetts constitution, most specifically the portion that reads: "All men are born free and equal, and have certain natural, essential, and unalienable rights; among which may be reckoned the right of enjoying and defending their lives and liberties; that of acquiring, possessing, and protecting property; in fine, that of seeking and obtaining their safety and happiness."
In 1780, Mum Bett prevented her master's wife from striking another slave in the household, Lizzie, thought to be her sister. Mum Bett left the house and refused to return. When Ashley tried to use the force of law to compel her to return to the household, she went to Theodore Sedgwick and asked him to represent her in a suit for her freedom.
Things get kind of murky
This is where, said Barbara Dowling, Trustees of Reservations historic site administrator, things get kind of murky. It is possible, she said, that Sedgwick may have in fact asked Mum Bett to help serve as a "test case," rather than the way the story is traditionally told. "They picked someone above reproach in all ways. . She was well-known and well-respected. This is somebody, who, if you were going to have a test case, this couldn't be about anything but the case," Dowling explained.
And so, on Aug. 21, 1781, the appeals court ruled in Mum Bett's favor, overturning the orginial decision in favor of Ashley and setting a legal precedent that would eventually lead to the end of slavery in Massachusetts.
This year, the Trustees are also highlighting "Mum Bett's Trail," a publication released last year. Part of the broader African American Heritage Trail, this publication highlights 10 key places from Ashley Falls to Stockbridge associated with Mum Bett's life and quest for freedom.
Dowling said this approach to Mum Bett is rather new. The line taken, even by the Trustees, in the past was that "Col. John Ashley was the first man to recognize the end of slavery by dropping the appeals," she said.
"We are recognizing that history is not white, male Protestant-centric," she said. Thus, the Trustees have decided to approach the story from Mum Bett's "courage of stepping forth - a black, a slave, a woman - going against the most powerful man in Sheffield," Dowling said.
Judging by the small rocks placed across the top of Mum Bett's headstone, I am not the only one moved by the story of this woman's courage and fortitude.
I hope you can continue to follow my cemetery adventures as next time I relate my findings in the town of Washington. Don't forget the bug spray - you'll need it!

The Trustees of Reservations' Mum Bett Day celebration will be held Friday, Aug. 21, with an open house at noon and speakers and performers beginning at 2 p.m. The event is free. Info: thetrustees.org. Assistant Editor Judith Fairweather can be reached at jfairweather@advocateweekly.com or 413-663-7942, ext. 234

In Egremont: When parents outlive children

2009-07-30T00:58:45Z

Editor's note: This is the fourth in a summer-long series in which Advocate Assistant Editor Judith Fairweather visits old to try to dig up interesting tidbits of local history. Read all her columns at blogtheberkshires.com.

By JUDITH FAIRWEATHER
EGREMONT -- The south Berkshire town of Egremont was incorporated on Feb. 13, 1760, from the lands west of the North Parish of Sheffield. However, many of the early records have been lost, destroyed in a fire somewhere around the year 1839.
But the people of Egremont were determined not to let their history slip away. A book was created by Mary L. and Diane Fratalone with an inventory of each graveyard and its occupants. The book is undated, but proved to be a major blessing as I was searching for stories for this column.
I focused on the Mount Everett Cemetery, a tiny and very old graveyard conveniently located right next door to the Egremont Free Library on Button Ball Lane. The Fratalones included with each entry the major families buried in the cemetery and a little bit about them. The rest of the inhabitants are listed alphabetically, by family, with their birth date, date of death and age.

]]> One notable Mount Everett resident is Philo Upson, a quarry owner who died Jan. 13, 1840, at age 37 when the paddle-wheeler the Lexington caught fire in Long Island Sound on its way to Connecticut. Only four people out of the 115 passengers and crew survived the wreck.
The oldest stone in the cemetery belongs to Maj. Joseph Benjamin, who fought in the Revolutionary War. Born July 1, 1763, he died on May 17, 1803, at age 39. But the real story here is his wife, Susannah, who lived until 1856, when she died at the age of 90. Not only did she outlive her husband by more than 50 years, but she also had to live with an eerie coincidence. She and her husband had one daughter, who was born Nov. 28, 1794. Emma was not even 9 when her father died. The coincidence lies in her date of death on Aug. 30, 1833 -- 30 years after her father died, and also at the age of 39. If I were Susannah Benjamin, I would certainly have stayed away from anything that had the number three -- or nine -- attached to it.
Susannah was not the only mother to experience grief in her lifetime. Amasa and Catherine Austin, born in 1774 and 1780, respectively, both lived into their 80s -- quite a long time, given that era. However, their lives were far from easy. They had seven children: Montgomery, born Dec. 3, 1800; Catherine, born Feb. 10, 1803; Amasa, born in 1806; Loomis, born in 1807; John, born June 10, 1810; Lydia, born Feb. 23, 1813; and Lovisa, born June 14, 1816.
Unfortunately, the Austin children were not as long-lived as their parents. The first to pass was young Catherine at age 13 in 1816, making hers the third-oldest grave in Mount Everett. The next was Montgomery in 1827, at the tender age of 26. A three short years later, young Amasa would die at only 24 years old. Twenty-three years would pass before John died at age 43 in 1853, the last child that Amasa the elder would have to bury before his death in 1857 at age 82. But it would not be the last for Catherine.
Lovisa would follow, at age 44 in 1861, and then Loomis in 1868 at age 61. Poor Catherine had to bury six of her seven children before dying herself in 1870 at age 89, leaving Lydia a true orphan, with no siblings and no parents. Lydia did not outlive her mother by much, passing in 1878 at age 65. It boggles my mind to think of those parents, burying one child after another.
The Baldwin family was another that suffered through the untimely deaths of the children before their parents. Davis and Amy Baldwin, born in 1777 and 1786, respectively, would see two of their four children die, and those deaths came just a little more than nine months apart. Edmund died Dec. 14, 1838, at age 21, while Algernon died Sept. 30, 1839, at age 28. The last two Baldwin siblings, listed as Orin and I.D.W., would outlive their parents, but also died close together. Orin died on April 5, 1889. I.D.W. died 21 days later, on April 26. Perhaps an illness swept through the area, taking the brothers in its wake.
The last story I unearthed in Egremont is not quite so tragic, but rather more mysterious than the others. It involves William H. Belcher, who was born in 1840 and died June 16, 1909, at age 69. William is buried with two wives. The first was the former Frances Margnet, who was 11 years younger than William, not out of the ordinary for the time. She died young, however, in 1885 at the age of 35. William then married the former Phoebe Miller, who was even younger -- six years younger than Frances, in fact. Again, Phoebe died before her time, at age 44 in 1901.
This situation created questions for which I have no answers. For example, if Phoebe had married William the same year in which Frances died, she would have been 28. That's pretty old for a first-time bride. Had she perhaps been married and lost a spouse of her own? I can't know that. Also, did Frances and Phoebe know each other? Was it difficult for Phoebe to be wife No. 2?
The tiny Mount Everett Cemetery turned out volumes of fodder for my musings. I hope you will follow me as I continue my wanderings, looking to see what new tales more old cemeteries will bring.

Assistant Editor Judith Fairweather can be reached at
jfairweather@advocateweekly.com or 413-663-7942, ext. 234.

Tales of sadness, bravery in Pittsfield cemeteries

2009-06-18T01:35:31Z

Editor's note: This is the second in a summer-long series in which Advocate Assistant Editor Judith Fairweather visits old cemeteries to try to dig up interesting tidbits of local history.

PITTSFIELD - Growing up on Roberta Road meant that I traveled West Street often, including to and from various events at Berkshire Community College. However, clearly my powers of observation are not that good.
Each time I drove out to BCC and back, I had to drive right past West Part Cemetery. Yet I never knew it existed until recently, when I met some extremely helpful women in the local history department at the Berkshire Athenaeum.
After my first Grave Matters column, I realized this topic was going to require more legwork than I had initially suspected. Thus, I made a reconnaissance trip to the library. My approach this time was going to be quite different. I intended to find my interesting people and then go search out their stones.

]]> It was actually far easier than I thought. The two knowledgeable women told me of the existence of two cemeteries I had never been aware of - West Part, out by BCC, and East Part, on outer Williams Street near Burgner's. They gave me tons of other great information and then handed me some folders chock-full of fascinating stuff.
I told them I didn't really have time that particular day to do research; I was really there to try and find out where to start. Even so, history geek that I am, the yellowed newspaper clippings peeking out of the folder sang their siren song and lured me to a big table. I was going to only flip through the files quickly, I told myself, so I would know where to start when I returned. Yeah, right. That's like a gambling addict going into a casino with the intention of only counting the slot machines.
Close to two hours later, I forcibly pulled myself out of the past, firmly shutting the files. When I went to return them, both women had disappeared. So here I am, journalist extraordinaire, with no names for my sources. Sigh. Thus is the power of a history addiction, which can sometimes overrule my logic and good sense.
The information they provided was a veritable treasure trove. I am interested in epitaphs and so was excited to find a compilation of the residents of both cemeteries along with each of their inscriptions. Across the top of the typewritten list it said, "From the Corbin manuscript collection in New England Genealogical Society." Bless the person who acquired those.
Take Leverrett Deming May, for example. May was the son of Chauncy and Huldah May. He died July 12, 1832, at the age of 5, and is buried in West Part. The following is inscribed on his stone: "Friends and Physicians cannot save/This mortal body from the grave/Nor can the grave confine it here/(unknown) . buried in cement."
Chauncy and Huldah May suffered much tragedy in their lives. Along with Leverrett, other children buried there include Andrew Jackson May, who died Feb. 3, 1832, at 7 months old; Augustus C. May, who died Oct. 19, 1817, at 17 months old; and Lemuel A. May, who died Nov. 13, 1825, at 2 years and 4 months old.
My pencil scribbles slowed as I recorded the names, years and ages, the significance dawning on me - four dead children, in the space of 15 years, two of them dying only five months apart. What grief those parents must have felt.
When I knelt in front of Leverrett's grave to take a picture of his stone, the epitaph nearly obliterated, I was overcome by sadness.
Clarissa Root, who died at age 45 on Jan. 13, 1814, is also buried in West Part. I was struck by the graphic nature of her epitaph: "Corruption earth and worms/Shall but refine this flesh./Till my triumphant spirit come/to put it on afresh." My daughters, who accompanied me on the search for my new-found friends, grimaced at the image those words inspired as we brushed away the grass clippings to trace the faint letters with our fingers.
After finishing up there, we traveled across town to East Part to find the grave of Sarah Deming. Deming arrived in 1752 in Pontoosuck (sometimes referred to as Pontoosuc) Plantation, the name of the settlement before it was renamed Pittsfield. She gave birth to the first white child born here. To the north of the settlement stretched several hundred miles of wilderness between it and French Canada.
That wilderness was home to the Abenaki Indians, who, in the service of the French, raided English settlements such as Pontoosuck.
Within East Part is a monument to Deming, inscribed on its various faces. One of the inscriptions, in part, reads: "Surrounded by Tribes of hostile Indians, she defended in more than one massacre, unaided, the lives and property of her family, and was distinguished for the courage and fortitude with which she bore the dangers and privations of a pioneer life. A mother of the Revolution and mother in Israel."
Keeping company with the brave Sarah Deming was Frank Hirst (1840-1911), a second lieutenant in Company E, 27th Regiment, Massachusetts Infantry, of the Grand Army of the Republic. A comrade in arms to poor Johnny Atwood of Hillside Cemetery in North Adams, Hirst had a large granite monument, rather than the slab with three initials that marks Atwood's final resting place.
Another East Part resident had an interesting epitaph. Aaron Roberts, who died May 21, 1830, one of numerous Roberts family members there, had these words for visitors: "When you my friends are passing by/And this informs you where I lie/Remember you ere long must have/like me a mansion in the grave."
In learning about these people, long turned to dust, I forged a connection to them. I can't wait to see whom I meet next.

A story by Gerald "Rory" B. O'Connor, which appeared in Berkshires Week on June 22, 1995, was used as a reference for some of the information in this column.
Judith Fairweather can be reached at 413-663-7942, ext. 234, or jfairweather@advocateweekly.com.

Marino offers an expert look at Hill Side Cemetery

2009-05-22T02:12:48Z

Editor's note: This is the first of a summer-long series in which Advocate Assistant Editor Judith Fairweather visits old cemeteries to try to dig up interesting tidbits of local history.

Last year, I spent my summer visiting all the Berkshire County tourist spots I had never seen, despite living here for 45 years.
This year, I was dying to delve deeper into some more local history, so I thought I would try and unearth some by visiting a few of the old and very picturesque cemeteries I have passed by on my travels across the county. (Don't worry. I think I've exhausted my need for bad puns now.)
But this is an area in which I have absolutely zero background, so I thought I would turn to someone who is in fact a cemetery expert - and also likes bad puns as well as I do. When it's North County cemeteries you want to know about, it's Paul Marino you call upon.

]]> Marino met me at Hill Side Cemetery in North Adams on a recent Saturday to shed some light on how to go about my cemetery quest. We started at the very top of the hill on the north side of Route 2. After struggling in my very slippery-soled clogs to the top of the steep hill, Marino told me, "They don't call it Hill Side for laughs!"
Lesson One learned: Always wear sneakers or light hiking boots. Shoes with bottoms as slick as a greased pig are not conducive to traipsing across grassy areas. I came down that same hill in my socks, to prevent a less than graceful upending.
Marino was quick to point out the oldest grave in the cemetery, which dates to the death of Olive Knight on Feb. 13, 1798, at the tender age of 18. Hill Side, he said, is the oldest municipal cemetery in North Adams, and the third-oldest overall. The very oldest, if it were still in existence, he said, would be the Fort Massachusetts burial ground, which is most likely located under where Price Chopper is now.
Olive Knight was a member of the farming family who started the plot. Lilles Knight, her mother, said Marino, deeded the land to use as a free burial ground, so in fact Hill Side was a Potter's Field, as well.
The graves we visited spiraled out from that original Knight line, those descendants including the Richmonds and Tinkers and so on, so many that the relationships Marino flung effortlessly about swam before my eyes, completely befuddling me. I couldn't keep up with the children, and the marriages, and the professions. It was as if he was a walking archive.
Marino has been offering free cemetery walks each summer since 1993. He said the way to start with cemetery research is with the cemetery department. "Another place you can go is the town or city clerk," he added.
Lesson Two learned: This column may take a lot more time than I had anticipated. Schedule these visits as early in the week as possible, so I have plenty of time to track down information.
In addition to being an invaluable resource about how to begin my research, Marino also didn't disappoint when it came to the personal stories I was looking for. Take, for example, Adelbert A. Haskins, who committed suicide in 1917. Born in 1839, he had been a member of Company B of the 10th Massachusetts Civil War regiment.
There was also Amasa Richardson, who had been mentioned in Nathaniel Hawthorne's "American Journal" by name, as a woman who had amassed a large bar tab at the North Adams House.
Perhaps most intriguing was poor Johnny Atwood, who had just a simple small memorial set into the ground with his three initials - not even a marker with a full name. Atwood had been a founding member of the Johnson Grays, a volunteer regiment organized prior to the Civil War. Those same Johnson Grays formally became Company B of the Massachusetts 10th when they enlisted.
Atwood was struck with sunstroke before the Battle of Gettysburg. He was there, however, to hear Abraham Lincoln deliver the Gettysburg Address. He also was chosen to serve as the color bearer for the Massachusetts color guard during the Gettysburg Cemetery dedication ceremony.
And yet Atwood had only a small plague in the ground. When Marino discovered he had no GAR marker - Grand Army of the Republic, used to indicate a Civil War veteran - he initiated its placement. "When we put the marker on Atwood's grave, there were still members of his family here. They were stunned by our interest in their ancestor," Marino said.
But of course there are sad stories, too, like that of the three Kimbell babies who died within a few days of each other, possibly in 1849, although the date had been nearly obliterated by time and weather from the marble headstones.
Marino has stories and information about many of the leading families, from the Kimbells (the New Kimbell Building) to Sarah T. Haskins (of Haskins School) to the Sullivans to archaeologist John Henry Haynes.
He is also well-versed in motifs used in headstones, such as the anchor, which represents faith in Christ with the waves representing the troubles faced in life; the lamb, used to show purity and innocence; and the upside down torch, symbolic of eternal life, as well as many others.
Marino's interest in cemeteries and his belief in their value closely echoes my own, and neatly sums up my reason for wanting to write this column this summer: "I have a passion for local history and I think it's important that the stories be known by as many as possible, especially children," he said.
Lesson Three learned: Find some more local cemetery experts. I don't think I can do this one on my own.

Advocate Assistant Editor Judith Fairweather can be reached at jfairweather@advocateweekly.com or 413-663-7942, ext. 234.