From Dave Brigham:
A graveyard, for me, is a crap shoot.
I find a cemetery, especially an old one with plenty of shade trees, lichen-covered headstones and obscure Biblical names, to be quite peaceful. I am respectful, treading away from where I believe the coffins are interred, and apologizing if I mistakenly misstep.
I didn't spend time in graveyards as a kid. My ancestors were buried in places far flung from my small Connecticut town -- Springfield, Massachusetts; Worcester, Vermont; Brooklyn, New York. As an adult, I walk through cemeteries with some regularity, but not to spend time with long-gone relatives. No, I walk past tombs, vaults, statues and busted headstones seeking out photo opportunities.
With many of these oases of the dead, I find that the grave markers look quite similar: two to three feet tall, made of dark stone, carved with a religious symbol (a finger pointing to Heaven) or message ("SAFE IN JESUS FOLD") or indication of military service.
I recently ventured to Holyhood Cemetery in Brookline, Mass., mainly because it was close to where I'd dropped my son off for a hike. I figured I'd check out the chapel there, and maybe spy a few cool gravestones to make photos of.
I found quite a bit more than I'd expected, thankfully, and plan to return to take in more.
The Fitzpatrick Chapel was erected in 1862, just five years after the cemetery was laid out. "The stone building was designed by Patrick Keeley, the noted architect who designed many mid-19th century Catholic churches including the Cathedral of the Holy Cross in Boston," per Holyhood's web site. "It is Gothic Revival style derived from an English Gothic country church."
It's quite lovely. Holyhood's layout "reflected the mid-19th century influence of romantic landscape cemetery planning begun at Cambridge's Mt. Auburn Cemetery in the 1830's," according to the web site. "It was the first such cemetery in Brookline. The name Holyhood was derived from the term used to designate the winding sheet in which the body of our Saviour was surrounded before interment."
Many of the graves I walked past and photographed during my short visit are for Irish Americans, many of them, I suspect, immigrants or first-generation citizens. Among the famous folks buried here are Joseph P. and Rose Kennedy, patriarch and matriarch of America's royal family; Massachusetts Governors Maurice Tobin, Foster Furcolo and Edward King; and George Wright, Baseball Hall of Fame inductee and golf course designer.
I set out to find contrast, and I found plenty of that.
(I love the green door set against the gray mausoleum.)
Most of the colors (besides gray) that I focused on were the result of oxidizing metal. I don't know enough about metals to know which type is used for gravestone plaques. I know that copper, iron, brass and bronze are among the metals that turn a greenish color with long-term exposure to the elements.
(Man, that star.)
(I'm not at all religious, but I appreciate a nice icon.)
Not only am I an atheist, I'm also a heretic, because when I see Jesus on the cross, all I can think about is the scene below from Monty Python's "Life of Brian""
More lovely contrasts....
In just about every old cemetery I visit, I find busted gravestones.
I've walked through plenty of graveyards, but I've never seen a grave with the name below.
The name is apparently more common than I realized. It's used for a line of menswear, grocery store components and by a woodcut printmaker.
I think it also represents the value expressed when people say, "His number was up. Yup, he reached one killion."
A few more stones of note....
A woman with a sword.
This was the first crypt I saw. I'm not sure whether someone broke in...or out.
This slab is for a family named Amrhein. Until writing this post, I assumed the name was Irish, since there is a well-known restaurant and bar by that name in South Boston, and one of my wife's law school friends, who is very Irish American, once worked there. The eatery was established in 1890, and has the oldest hand carved bar in America and the first draft beer pump in Boston, per its web site. Since Southie used to be an Irish stronghold, I made an assumption. Turns out the name is German and Alsatian, according to Ancestry.com
I don't know if the folks buried here are from the family that started the restaurant. I wrote about Amrhein's in November 2018, when there were fears the restaurant would be shuttered (see November 17, 2018, "Southie to Lose An Institution"). The latest news comes from June, when the building was sold -- yet again -- to a group that plans a multi-use project that will keep part of the Amrhein's building, and erect a five-story building comprising office/lab space, as well as restaurant and retail footage, according to this article from The Real Reporter.
There are a lot of Mark Twain-looking busts and plaques in Holyhood.
Every tomb I saw was a traditional stone crypt, fashioned in the 19th or early 20th century, either built into a hillside or hulking on the ground, looking like something out of a Gothic tale of woe. Except one.
This vault for the Stewart family is the most modern one I've seen in any cemetery.
(Detail from the Stewart crypt.)
I'm going to wrap up with two graves of note.
James Jeffrey Roche was an Irish-American poet, journalist and diplomat, born in Ireland in 1847. He and his family emigrated to Prince Edward Island, Canada, when he was young. By age 19, he'd moved to Boston, where he found a job with the Boston Pilot, an Irish newspaper at which he eventually rose to editor-in-chief. Towards the end of his life he served his government in the diplomatic service as American consul to Switzerland, according to that linked article.
My favorite grave marker is for John Boyle O'Reilly, another Samuel Clemens look-alike, and one with quite a back story.
This plaque is located on a boulder under some shade trees. Quite nice. "Born in Dowth [in 1844], O'Reilly moved to his aunt's residence in England as a teenager and became involved in journalism and shortly after became involved in the military," per Wikipedia. "He left the military however in 1863 after becoming angry with the army's treatment of the Irish, and returned to Ireland the same year. In 1864 he joined the Irish Republican Brotherhood under an assumed name and was part of the group for two years until he and many others were arrested by authorities in early 1866. After a trial the same year he was sentenced to death which was later commuted to 20 years' penal servitude. In 1867 O'Reilly was transported to Western Australia and moved to the town of Bunbury where he escaped two years later."
OK, that's a whole life already by age 24. But O'Reilly was just getting started. He made it to the U.S. and soon moved to Boston. "It was in the US, during a time of intense economic and social turmoil, where O’Reilly’s brilliance flourished. As editor of The Pilot, a Boston newspaper, he became a powerful advocate of the rights of workers and African-Americans. He retained a strong commitment to Ireland and was an important part of the Land League and Home Rule movements," according to JohnBoyleOreilly.com.
"O'Reilly was one of the most famous literary figures of his day, publishing four volumes of poetry and two novels," including Moondyne, a novel; poems "The Cry of the Dreamer" and "The White Rose"; and a collection, "Songs from the Southern Seas."
He has been recognized in modern pop culture. On its Rattle and Hum album, U2 performs a song, "Van Diemen's Land," which references and is dedicated to O'Reilly. The county Clare folk singer Sean Tyrrell has set a number of O'Reilly's poems to music, according to Wikipedia. His mugshot is included among other infamous criminals featured on wine bottles produced by 19 Crimes.
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