Wisner Park Cemetery, Elmira, Chemung County, New York (original) (raw)

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WISNER BURYING GROUND (7/1802-10/1877)

ALSO CALLED BAPTIST BURYING GROUND, CHURCH STREET CEMETERY, MAIN STREET CEMETERY, OLD CHURCH STREET CEMETERY, BAPTIST CHURCH CEMETERY

City of Elmira, Chemung County, New York

WISNER CEMETERY; also known as" Baptist Burying Ground", "Church Street Cemetery", "Main Street Cemetery", "Old Church Street Cemetery", and "Baptist Church Cemetery".
Read by Doris Boyd
Date Read: August 27, 1973
Typed by Debora M. Vanhook Park
Location: Located between West Church and West Gray Streets, east of North Main St, in the City of Elmira, NY

WISNER BURYING GROUND (7/1802-10/1877)
ALSO CALLED BAPTIST BURYING GROUND, CHURCH STREET CEMETERY, MAIN STREET CEMETERY, OLD CHURCH STREET CEMETERY, BAPTIST CHURCH CEMETERY

The Wisner, or Baptist, Burying Ground was located between West Church and West Gray Streets, immediately east of North Main Street in the City of Elmira. It is today used as a public park with the name Wisner after the donor of the land.

In 1788 the land was plotted as Lots #28 and #29 and owned by Henry Wisner. His son Jeffrey gave the lots to the village of Newtown in 1802 for cemetery use. The original burial ground of the new village was located on land of Stephen Tuttle near the junction of East Water and Sullivan Streets, but it must have been small and filled by 1802, as the first burial in the new Wisner took place on July 29 or 30, 1802, being the body of Doctor Joseph Hinchman, the second physician in the area. As far as known, no bodies were ever removed from the cemetery on East Water Street, and its location was lost as the village grew.

By the time of the termination of the Civil War, the Wisner Burial Ground had reached a point where very little burial space was left, and the grounds had deteriorated, appearing as though it had no care for many years. It was a decided “eye sore” with dead trees, uncut grass and weeds, fences dilapidated and broken in several places, and the tombstones sunken, broken, or tipped over. As a result of the decadent condition, there were those who desired that the use of the land be discontinued as a public burial site and converted into a park. The subject of a change was before the city authorities for several years, but it was feared that the land would revert back to any of the descendents of the original owners if it was put to any use other than a cemetery.

On June 7, 1875, Mayor Smith presented a communication to the Common Council in which he suggested that inquiries be made as to the legal difficulties, if any, in the way of removing the bodies; also what the cost of removal of the remains would be. A committee was appointed and reported to the Council on September 5th that there were no vested private titles in and to any portion of the graveyard, thus making those who were buried there mere squatters and remaining only by the sufferance of the city! The Committee also reported the cost of the taking up of the remains would amount to $668.50. This included new boxes and the resetting of the headstones. The city then advertised in the newspapers for six months their intentions, informing friends and relatives interested that during that time they could remove the bodies themselves, should they elect to do so, and at the end of the six month period the city would remove all the bodies, placing them in the new Woodlawn Cemetery. On September 20th, the report was accepted.

There were 227 headstones with legible inscriptions, 96 for them being for persons between one and ten years of age; 21 between ten and twenty years; 110 over twenty years of age. There were seventeen graves with low stones with no inscriptions, and 23 that appeared sunken into the ground, either because the bodies had been removed, or were so decayed that nothing but dust remained to support the upper earth.

The task of removing the remains was entrusted to John Jones, an ex-slave who had found friends in Elmira during his flight from Virginia prior to the outbreak of the Civil War. In 1844, he returned from Canada to make his home in the city, and from 1847 until 1890, served as the sexton of the First Baptist Church. He began as a grave digger soon after settling in his new home, and prepared the graves of hundreds of persons in the Wisner, Second Street, and Woodlawn Cemeteries. During the Civil War, when the Federal government maintained a prison camp just west of Elmira for Confederate soldiers, he buried all the southerners who died while confined behind the walls.

In 1877, all the remains still in the Wisner Burial Ground were removed, under the direction of John Jones. Prior to that, on October 9, 1858, he removed the body of Colonel John Hendy, considered by many to be the first settler in what was to become Elmira. He had died in 1840 and had been buried on a raw March day.

Speaking of the removal of the Revolutionary War veteran’s remains, in later years, John Jones said: “ I found the skeleton all complete and the hair was long and beautiful, white and wavy – remarkable. I took it up and hung it in my hands like a perfect wig. The men that watched me said it was wonderful.”

Jones then carefully placed the hair at the head of the skeleton and it was forever sealed from sight in the new coffin that had been provided. Jones then reburied the coffin in Woodlawn.

Before all the headstones were removed, Ausburn Towner, a local historian, newspaperman, and writer, copied the inscriptions the best he could, and the data was published in the local newspapers.

The following is that list, with some added data enclosed in brackets. This information does not appear on the gravestones, but is added for interest. Stones marked with * indicate markers which were found on August 27, 1973, at the Woodlawn Cemetery, Elmira, New York, by Doris Boyd. Without a doubt, there are many others scattered about the site.

Published On Tri-Counties Site On 11/6/99

Bradford County PA Chemung County NY Tioga County PA
Published On Tri-Counties Site On 11/06/1999_By Joyce M. Tice_ Email: Joyce M. Tice You are the visitor since the counter was installed on 08 DEC 2004