Week 21 Tombstone
We are fortunate in genealogy research if there is a
tombstone in place over an ancestor’s grave.
It tells us not only what is written on the stone, but that our ancestor
is buried here, and that someone had the means to erect a memorial. These are the easy ones.
More difficult are the ancestors whose memorials have
disappeared, or who never had one in the first place. Many of my forebears lie in places where
there is no stone because no one could afford to erect one. In some cases, there is no memorial because
it has eroded away with time. In North
Lismore Pioneer Cemetery, which I wrote about last year (Week 22 – In the
Cemetery) surviving tombstones were moved in the 1980s and placed against the
side of a hill to protect them from flood and environmental damage. Thus there is no knowing where exactly the
grave is. This has the added effect of
removing context – we can often learn a lot from the people who are buried in
the same area as our ancestor. Gradually the words on most of the Lismore stones
are disappearing too. When they go, some
of the story goes too.
This is the tombstone of Paul’s 2 x great grandfather and
there is a mystery at the heart of the words which will disappear when they fade
away –
why is Charles mourned by his “Mother, sisters and brothers” ? Where is his widow? Reading this headstone many years ago made us
very keen to find out more about the circumstances of Charles’ death and his
wife’s absence from the inscription.*
 |
| Charles William McCann 1851-1889 |
 |
| Grandson Paul McCann and great Grandson Brendan McCann, Dublin 2017 |
Another problem is the need for cemeteries to be relocated as “progress” catches up with their position. The first cemetery in the colony of NSW was the Old Sydney Burial Ground, situated on the edge of town and chosen by Governor Phillip and the Reverend Richard Johnson in September 1792. This is now the site of Sydney Town Hall.
By 1820, the cemetery
was full, so Governor Macquarie ordered the consecration of the Devonshire
Street Cemetery in the growing town of Sydney.
Also called Sandhills Cemetery, this was the principal burial ground in
Sydney from 1820 until 1866, when it was closed. Then in 1901, the land was resumed to allow
for the development of Central Railway station and representatives of the
deceased buried there were given two months to arrange for exhumation and removal
of remains.
Many other cemeteries were used but the majority of
the remains went to Bunnerong Cemetery, south of the city. A tram line was constructed to make the
removal of recasketed remains as simple as
possible. Bunnerong Cemetery was next to the Botany Cemetery and, in the early
1970s, was absorbed by that cemetery to create the Eastern Suburbs Memorial Park.
This is where we found the
tombstone of Rosetta Johnson, Paul’s 4 x great grandmother who died in
1845. She had come to the colony as a convict
in 1815, having been sentenced to transportation for 7 years for the crime of stealing
18 yards of sheeting value 27 shillings and 1 shawl property of William Goff,
value 30 shillings. She travelled with
her 6 year old daughter, Catherine, who was to marry Nicholas McCann, and in
the colony she married John Beale, another convict, who became a loving
stepfather to Catherine and a wise counsellor to others in the family.
It is now almost impossible to read the words
on Rosetta’s tombstone. They are:
“Rosetta Beale, wife of John Beale of
Parramatta, died 13th Feb 1845, aged 65 years"
*The inscription on Charles' headstone reads:
"Charles McCann
Drowned in Wilsons Creek
April 15th 1889
Aged 38 Years
Leaving his Mother Sisters and Brothers
to Mourn their Loss
(4 lines of verse)
Erected by his loving Mother"
