EPITAPHS TO REMEMBER
formerly
published as
OVER
THEIR
DEAD
BODIES
. . . . .
Yankee
Epitaphs
& History
. . . . .
THOMAS C. MANN and JANET GREENE
Illustrated by George Daly
THE STEPHEN GREENE PRESS
BRATTLEBORO, VERMONT 1962
Courtesy of Alan C. Hood & Co., Inc.
P.O. Box 775
Chamsburg, PA 17201
24. JOHN KENDALL, 1759,
age 63, Dunstable, Mass.:
Life is a Blessing can't be sold
The Ransom is too high,
Justice will ne'er be brid'd with gold
That man may never die.
You see the Foolish & the Wise
The Tim'rous & the Brave
Quite their Possessions, close their eyes
And hasten to the Grave.
31. SCOTLAND, CONN. (-mainly
of interest because
the gravestone was designed and cut by her grandson):
Her Lyes ye Body
of Mrs. Abigail Wife
to Capt. John Man-
ing Who Depart-
ed this Life July
30th 1770 in ye 73d
year of her Age
Made by Rockwell
Manning aged 13 years
33. REPORTED FROM HEARSAY
as in Hatfield, Mass.,
and Pownal, Vt., its model is obviously a longer version in
Plymouth, England, 1750:
Here lies as silent as clay
Miss Arabella Young
Who on the 21st of May
1771
Began to hold her tongue.
47. NORTH ATTLEORO, MASS.:
Here lies the best of slaves
Now turning into dust
Caesar the Ethiopian craves
A place among the Just.
His faithful soul is fled
To realms of heavenly light,
And by the blood that Jesus shed
Is changed from Black to White.
Jany. 15 he quitted the stage
in the 77th year of this age.
1780
48. MIDDLETOWN, CONN.:
Joshua son of Mr Joshua & Mrs Anna
Miller who was killed with a
Sawmill May 26th AD 1781
In the 15th Year of his Age.
49. WETHERSFIELD, CONN.:
Here lie interred Mrs. Lydia
Beadle Age 32 Years
Ansell Lothrop Elizabeth Lydia & Mary
Beadle her Children: the eldest aged
11 and the youngest 6 years Who
on the morning of the 11th day of Decr AD 1782
Fell by the hands of William Beadle
an infatuated Man who closed the
horrid sacrifice of his Wife
& Children with his own destruction.
Pale round their grassy tomb bedewd with tears
Flit the thin forms of sorrows and of fears:
Soft sighs responsive swell to plaintive chords
And indignation half unsheathe their swords.
58. EiGHTY-ODD YEARS after
his death, actually at the
age of 52, a splendid monument was erected to the mem-
ory of the Hero of Ticondergoa and leader of the Green
Mountain Boys—which doesn't mention the red-hot con-
troversy he fostered with his skeptical treatise Reason, the
Only Oracle of Man. This was the inscription on his first
stone, which once stood near the present memorial in
Burlington, Vt.:
The
Corporeal Part
of
Genl. Ethan Allen
rests beneath this stone
the 12th day of Feb. 1789,
aged 50 years.
His spirit tried the mercies of his God
In whom alone he believed and strongly trusted.
59. WILLIAM KITTREDGE, 1789,
age 91, Tewksbury
Mass.:
He's gone at length, how many grieve
Whom he did generously relieve
But o how shocking he expire
Amidst the flames of raging fire!
Yet all who sleep in Christ are bless'd
Whatever way they are undress'd.
60. COVENTRY, CONN.:
This monument is erected in
Memory of Capt Joseph Talcott
who was Casually Drowned in the
Proud Waters of the Scungamug River
on the 10th Day of June 1789
in ye 62nd year of his age
61. KENSINGTON, N.H.:
Serene and calm the mind in peace
His virtues shone with mild increase.
In Memory of
Benjamin Rowe Esq
Who after a Life of great usefullness
& patiently enduring 4 years ilness
with a dropsy underwent the Operation
of Tappling 67 times
From his body was drawn 2385 pounds of water
quietly departed this Life the 28 day
of March Anno Domini 1790 in
the 71st year of his age.
62. MARY HUMPREY, 1791, age 36, Athol, Mass.:
May glass is run
With graceful & engaging mein
She trod the carpet & the green
With such refulgent virtues deckt
As gained her wide & warm respect.
Prim health sat blooming on her cheeks
Till Fortune play'd her cruel freaks
Her Limbs in tort' ring pains confin'd
That wreck'd her joints tho not her Mind
By faith and patience fortified
The rudest tempest to abide
‘Bove which she soar'd to realms of bliss
When Jesus hail'd her with a kiss.
63. MARY FOWLER, 1792, age 24, Milford, Conn.:
Molly tho' pleasant in her day
Was suddenly seized and went away
How soon she's ripe, how soon she's rotten
Laid in her grave and soon forgotten.
64. NEW HAVEN, CONN.:
In Memory of
Samuel Barns Son of
Mr Samuel Barns & Mrs
Welthy Barns whose
Death was Occasion'd
by a Scald from a Tea pot
March 27th 1794 age 7
Months
Suffer little Children to Come unto
me and forbid them not for of
Such is the Kingdom of Heaven
68. MRS. SARAH NEWCOMB,
1796, age 39, Keene,
N.H.:
How loved, how valued once avails thee not
To whom related or by whom begot;
A heap of dust alone remains of thee
‘Tis all thou are, and what we all must be.
69. DR. POLYCARPUS CUSHMAN,
1797, age 47, Bern-
ardston, Mass.:
Vain censorius beings little know
What they must soon experience below,
Your lives are short, eternity is long;
O think of death, prepare & then begone
Thus art & Nature's powers and charms
And drugs & receipts and forms
Yield all, at last, to greedy worms,
A despicable prey.
70. MARY LEFAVOUR, 1797, age 74, Topsfield, Mass.:
Reader pass on the ne'er waste your time,
On bad biography and bitter rhyme
For what I am this crumb'rous clay insures,
And what I was, is no affair of yours.
71. Unbolstered by dates
and reported as in Ver-
mont or Iowa:
Here lies our darling baby boy
He never crys not hollers
He lived for one and twenty days
And cost us forty dollars.
72. Also included as in
Burlington, Mass. (-and
reported, too, as in Burlington, N.J., but with the name
as Mary Ann Lowder and without a date):
Here lies the body of Susan Lowder
Who burst while drinking a Sedlitz Powder.
Called from this world to her heavenly rest,
She should have waited till it effervesced.
1798
73. RANDOLPH CENTER, VT.(-a
fairly modern stone
to honor a country singing-master whose name is per-
petuated in the first American breed of horse):
Justin Morgan
1747 1798
This man brought to
Vermont the colt from
which all Morgan Horses
are descended.
74. SEVERAL VERSIONS are reported as in Lincoln, Me.:
Sacred to the Memory of Mr
Jared Bates who Died Aug. the 6th
1800. His Widow age 24 who mourns
as one who can be comforted lives
at 7 Elm street this village
and possesses every qualification
for a good Wife.
77 & 78. JAFFREY, N.H.:
Sacred to the Memory of Amos Fortune
who was born free in Africa
a slave in America, he purchased
liberty; professed Christianity,
lived reputably, died hopefully
Nov. 17 1801 Aet. 91.
Sacred to the Memory of Violate
by purchase the slave of Amos Fortune
by marriage his wife, by her
fidelity his companion and solace
She died his Widow Sept. 13 1802 AET. 73
130. ALBERT FULLER, 1838, age 16, Putney, Vt.:
His death was occasioned by
and accidental blast of powder
on July 4th.
131. CAPT. THOMAS COFFIN,
1842, age 50, New Shore-
ham, R.I.:
He's done a-catching cod
And gone to meet his God.
132. BRATTLEBORO, VT.:
Experiance
relict of Samuel
Wellington, died
Dec. 17, 1838.
AE. 69.
her first husband
was Elias Bemis.
133. NEW IPSWICH, N.H.:
Mr Gilman Spaulding
Was kill'd with an axe
By an insane Brother
Sept. 19, 1842.
Aet. 38.
137. YANKEES played a major
part in the spread of
whaling in the Atlantic and Pacific—until petroleum was
discovered in the United States in 1859 and kerosene
thereafter took over as the leading fuel for lamps—and
their epitaphs can be read in profusion around Nantucket
and New Bedford, with even one so far inland as Hinsdale,
N.H. In Montville, Conn.
Daniel Chappell
Who was killed in the act
of taking a whale
October 15, 1845
age 25 years.
Blessed are they that die in the Lord.
138. POWNAL, VT.:
Solomon Towslee Jr
Who was kill'd in Pownal
Vt. July 15, 1846, while
repairing to Grind a sithe
on a stone atach'd to the
Gearing in the Woollen
Factory. he was entangled
his death was sudden & awful.
140. SETH J. MILLER, 1848, age 46, Rehobot
My wife from me departed
And robbed me like a knave
Which caused me broken hearted
To descend into my grave.
My children took an active part
And to doom me did contrive
Which struck a dagger to my heart
Which I could not survive.
156. PELHAM, MASS.:
Warren Gibbs
Died by arsenic poisoning
Mar. 23, 1860
Aged 36 yrs. 5 ms. 23 dys.
Think my friends when this you see
How my wife has done for me
She in some oysters did prepare
Some poison for my lot and fare
Then of the same I did partake
And Nature yielded to its fate.
Before she my wife became
Mary Felton was her name.
Erected by his brother
Wm. Gibbs
185. Even more explicit
is the stone reported as in
Stowe, Vt.:
I was somebody.
Who, is no business
of yours.
186. WINSTEAD, CONN.:
Aaron S. Burbank
1818 1883
Bury me not when I am dead
Lay me not down in a dusty bed
I could not bear the life down there
With earth worms creeping through my hair