Springfield Cemetery

A view looking east up one of the terraces in Springfield Cemetery, around 1892. Image from Picturesque Hampden (1892).

The scene in 2020:

As explained in the previous post, Springfield Cemetery was established in 1841 as one of the first rural cemeteries in the northeast. Inspired by Mount Auburn Cemetery in Cambridge and Watertown, these types of cemeteries sought to create a pleasant, park-like atmosphere, in contrast to the older, gloomier Puritan-era graveyards in town centers. The cemetery was laid out in an area once known as Martha’s Dingle, located a little to the east of downtown Springfield. The land here consists of several steep-sided ravines, making it poorly suited for real estate development but ideal for a tranquil rural cemetery.

In developing the cemetery, some of the slopes were transformed into terraces, such as this one here. This particular view shows the view of the cemetery facing east from near its geographic center. In the foreground is the lower section, which had few interments during the 19th century, and further in the distance is the slope leading up to the upper section, which is adjacent to Pine Street. In general, the further up the hill that the gravestones are, the older they tend to be, culminating with the colonial-era stones along Pine Street, which were moved there from the old burying ground on Elm Street in 1848.

In this particular scene, most of the gravestones in the first photo date to the late 19th century, so they would have been relatively new when the photo was taken. Since then, many more burials have occurred here, but there are still some stones that are recognizable from the first photo. Near the center of the photo is a rectangular granite stone of businessman Warner C. Sturtevant (1809-1891), his wife Nancy (1811-1885), and several of their children and grandchildren. Just to the right of it, and a little closer to the foreground, is the marble stone of Samuel W. Fisher (1817-1884) and his wife Lorinda (1826-1885). In the distance beyond this stone is a large obelisk for the Merriam family, including dictionary publisher Charles Merriam (1806-1887), his wives Sophia (1808-1858) and Rachel (1824-1888), and several of their children.

Today, more than 125 years after the first photo was taken, there are now many more gravestones here in this scene, most dating to the first half of the 20th century. Among the more notable burials here in this scene are George Walter Vincent Smith (1832-1923) and his wife Belle (1845-1928), who were both prominent philanthropists and art patrons. They amassed an extensive art collection that they subsequently donated to the city as the George Walter Vincent Smith Art Museum, and they are buried here, just to the right of the tree on the left side of the scene.

Aside from the addition of more gravestones, some of the stones from the first photo are now gone, possibly having been replaced by newer monuments. Overall, though, this scene remains largely the same as it appeared in the late 19th century. Springfield Cemetery is still an active cemetery, and it continues to have the same natural, park-like appearance that its founders envisioned some 180 years ago. The city has since grown up around the cemetery, but from here it is hard to tell that these wooded ravines are right in the midst of one of the largest cities in New England.

A scene in Springfield Cemetery, facing the southern section of the cemetery, around 1892. Image from Picturesque Hampden (1892).

The scene in 2020:

Springfield Cemetery was established in 1841, and it was part of a trend that involved creating well-landscaped, park-like cemeteries on the outskirts of cities and towns, as opposed to the older, often gloomier Puritan-era graveyards in town centers. The first of these cemeteries was Mount Auburn Cemetery in the suburbs of Boston, which opened in 1831, and many other cities soon followed, including Springfield a decade later. Over the years, it would become the final resting place for many of the city’s prominent 19th century residents, and it remains an active cemetery today.

The cemetery is located in a ravine that was originally known as Martha’s Dingle. In transforming the area into a cemetery, the designers incorporated the natural features into the landscape by creating a series of terraces that were separated by wooded slopes. These were linked together by curving paths that followed the contours of the land. Overall, the intent was to create a place that would serve not only as a burial ground for the dead, but also as a quiet, peaceful place for the living to visit.

The view here in these two photos shows the upper section of the cemetery, facing south in the direction of Cedar Street. In the distance is the southernmost section of the cemetery, which, unlike the rest of the cemetery, lacks the winding paths and landscaped terraces. Instead, the lots here are laid out on flat ground, with few trees and with straight paths that intersect at right angles in a grid pattern. Most of the gravestones in that section date to the second half of the 19th century, and by the time the first photo was taken in the early 1890s it was already crowded with towering obelisks and other monuments.

By contrast, the slightly lower area here in the foreground was nearly devoid of gravestones when the first photo was taken. Of the two that are present near the foreground, the one in the lower center of the scene has apparently been removed or replaced, but the other one, further to the left, is still there. It features a veiled figure with an urn standing atop an Ionic column, marking the grave of James Abbe, who died in 1889 at the age of 66. He was a stove and tin merchant, and he was also a director for several local corporations, including serving as president of the Hampden Watch Company. In addition, he was a state legislator from 1876-1877, and he served as a trustee for the Springfield Cemetery Association.

Today, more than 125 years after the first photo was taken, Abbe’s gravestone is still here, although it is now mostly hidden by a tree from this angle. Otherwise, the most significant difference here is the number of gravestones in the foreground. This section was mostly empty in the early 1890s, but it now features a number of 20th century gravestones. Perhaps the most prominent person buried in this section is Horace A. Moses, a paper manufacturer and philanthropist who was one of the founders of Junior Achievement. He died in 1947, and his gravestone is the bench-like monument on the far left side of the scene.

Overall, despite the increase in gravestones, this section of Springfield Cemetery has not changed much since the late 19th century. The level upper section in the distance is mostly hidden behind trees from here, but it still looks largely the same as it did in the first photo, with rows of large monuments. By contrast, even though it has more gravestones now than in the first photo, the area in the foreground still has much more of a rural, park-like appearance, with its winding roads and mature shade trees, as shown in the present-day scene.

The Pynchon family plot in Springfield Cemetery, around 1892. Image from Picturesque Hampden (1892).

The scene in 2020:

Springfield Cemetery was established in 1841, but it includes the remains of many of Springfield’s earliest colonial settlers, dating back to the mid-1600s. Originally, these residents were buried in a graveyard in downtown Springfield, on Elm Street between Old First Church and the Connecticut River. However, by the 1840s that land had become valuable real estate in the center of a growing town, and part of the graveyard was in the path of a new railroad along the river. Because of this, in 1848 the remains were exhumed, and nearly all were reinterred in Springfield Cemetery.

A total of 2,434 bodies were removed from the old graveyard, along with 517 gravestones. Friends and family members of the deceased had the option of having the remains buried in a different cemetery, or in a private lot here in Springfield Cemetery, but most were interred along the Pine Street side of the cemetery. Those bodies accompanied by gravestones were buried beneath their respective stones, and the hundreds of unidentified remains with no gravestones were buried in an adjacent lot.

Among those buried in private lots were members of the Pynchon family. The Pynchons were probably the most influential family in the early years of Springfield’s history, in particular the family patriarch, William Pynchon, who founded the settlement in 1636. He returned to England in 1652 after the publication of his controversial book, which the Puritan leaders found heretical, so he was not buried in Springfield. However, his children stayed here in Springfield, where they would play an important role in the town throughout the rest of the 17th century.

One of William Pynchon’s children was his daughter Mary, who came to Springfield as a teenager in the 1630s and married Elizur Holyoke in 1640. She died in 1657, and her gravestone is the oldest surviving stone here in the cemetery. It is visible on the left side of this scene, just behind and to the left of the large monument in the center of the photos. Gravestones were uncommon in New England before the late 1600s, as early burials were typically marked by simple fieldstones or wooden markers, if at all. Few gravestones in the region are dated prior to the 1660s, and many of these were likely carved years or decades after the fact. It is possible that Mary’s gravestone was carved at a later date, but either way it is definitely very old and was likely carved at some point in the 1600s.

Aside from its age, Mary Pynchon Holyoke’s gravestone is also memorable for its epitaph, which reads:

Shee yt lyes here was while she stood
A very glory of womanhood
Even here was sown most pretious dust
Which surely shall rise with the just

When her body was disinterred from the old burying ground in the spring of 1848, the remains of two different people were found beneath this stone. Writing several decades later in 1885, in Record of the Pynchon Family in England and America, Dr. J. C. Pynchon speculated that the second body may have been Elizur Holyoke, although there is no known record of where he was buried. In any case, there was little left of either body, with Pynchon writing:

These remains were found side by side, in the white sand, about six feet below the surface. This sand was discolored, and some few pieces of the skulls and other bones were found, while even the screws or nails of the coffins were wholly destroyed, their places being marked by the rust only, while no other vestige of the coffins remained. The few remains were gathered, which soon crumbled to dust on exposure to the air, and, with the surrounding earth, deposited in the new cemetery, after having lain in the old burying ground, in the case of Mary Holyoke, one hundred and ninety-one years.

Aside from Mary’s gravestone, the Pynchon family lot here also includes the large monument in the center of the scene. As indicated by the inscription here on this side of it, the monument was “Erected under a provision in the will of Edward Pynchon, who died Mar. 17, 1830. Æ 55.” Edward Pynchon was the 4th great grandson of William Pynchon, and he held a number of local political offices, including town clerk, town treasurer, county treasurer, and county register of deeds. In his will, he noted that the old Pynchon family monument had fallen into disrepair, and instructed his executors to install a new monument on the same spot in the old burying ground, with inscriptions for the family members buried there. This was carried out after his death, and then in the late 1840s this monument was moved here to this lot in Springfield Cemetery, presumably accompanied by the remains of the Pynchons who were buried beneath it.

The monument is carved of sandstone, which was the most common gravestone material in the Connecticut River Valley during the 17th, 18th, and early 19th centuries. However, sandstone does not always weather very well, and many of the inscriptions on the Pynchon monument have been eroded away, particularly here on the west side, where the entire panel has been obliterated. Although much of the monument is now illegible, the Springfield Republican published a transcription of it in 1911, along with the location of each name:

(East side over panel):— Hon. John Pynchon died Jan 17 1702, Æ 76, Amy his wife died Jan 9 1698 Æ 74

(South end): Hon John Pynchon died Apr 25 1721 Æ 74, Margaret his wife died Nov 11, 1746

(On north end): John Pynchon 3d Esq. died July 12, 1742 Æ 68. Bathshua his wife died June 20 1710 Æ 27; Phebe his wife dwho died Oct 10 1722 Æ 36; John Pynchon his son died Apr 6 1754 Æ 49.

(On west side over panel): Erected under a provision in the will of Edward Pynchon who died Mar 17 1830 Æ 55.

(On west side in panel, probably a continuation of north end): Bathshua his daughter & wife of Lieut Robert Harris died 1760 Æ 52.
William Pynchon Eqs. son of Hon John Pynchon 2d died Jan 1741 Æ 52; Catharine his wife died Apr 10 1747 Æ 47; Sarah their daughter wife of Josiah Dwight Esq died Aug 4 1755 Æ 34. Edward Pynchon Esq son of John Pynchon 3d died Jan 11 1783, Æ 80.

(On west side under panel) Susan wife of Edward Pynchon died Oct 15 1872 Æ 82.

(East side panel) Sarah relict of William Pynchon Esq died Feb 21 1796 Æ 84.
Elizabeth relict of Benjamin Colton daughter of John Pynchon 3d Esq died Sept 26 1776 Æ 74; Capt George Pynchon son of John Pynchon 3d died June 26 1797 Æ 81; Maj William Pynchon died Mar 24 1808 Æ 69; Lucy his wife died Feb 17 1814 Æ 75; John Pynchon died Mar. 1826 Æ 84.

The first photo was taken a little over 40 years after the gravestones were moved here to Springfield Cemetery. Since then, there have been a few small changes, such as the deterioration of the inscriptions on the Pynchon monument. Along with this, there are now newer gravestones in this section of the cemetery, and several of the 19th century gravestones appear to have been removed or replaced, including the one in the lower foreground of the first photo. This one might still be here, as there is a mostly-buried gravestone in the same location today, but its lettering is mostly illegible. Overall, though, despite these changes this scene still looks much the same as it did more than 125 years ago, and Springfield Cemetery retains its appearance as a rural cemetery in the midst of a large city.