Tag: Smith (Philip)

  • Some Amateur Tombstones in Brush Creek Cemetery

    HERE
    RESTETH IN GOD
    CHRISTINA WEGL
    WAS BORN 23 MAY 18—
    DIED 23 DEC. 1811

    [The birth date is obscured in the picture. Sorry about that.]

    Is “amateur” the word we are looking for? There are tombstones in the Brush Creek Cemetery that are remarkable works of folk art—and then there are these, some of which appear to have been made by craftsmen who were quite good at scratching letters in stone, but none of which seem to rise to the level of professional stonecutting.

    There were a fair number of Germans among the early settlers. Some of the families have some of their tombstones in English and others in German. Father Pitt earnestly solicits corrections to his German translations.

    J. W.
    B. 1718
    D. 1802

    The plaque gives the name of this Revolutionary War veteran as John Wagle; he is buried near Christina Wegl, and Wagle and Wegl are almost certainly different ways of spelling the same name.

    IN
    MEMORY
    OF
    PHILIP SMITH
    HE WAS BORN 1743
    AND DIED 1824
    AGED 76

    HERE LIES
    LUDWIG KAEMMERER
    DIED JANUARY
    21ST 1808 AGED
    90 YEARS

    Old Pa Pitt is assuming that the line over the M indicates a doubled letter.

    HERE LIES
    MAGDALENA
    KAEMMERIN DIED
    JUNE 12th IN THE
    YEAR 1794 AGED 26

    If this was installed when Magdalena died, then this is one of the earliest legible tombstones in the area.

    IN
    MEMORY
    OF
    LUDWIG
    KEMERER Junr. HE
    WAS BORN AD 1749
    DEPARDET THIS
    LIFE 1817 AGE —

    This seems to be the work of the same stonecutter—perhaps a family member—who did the two German stones above. Note the different spelling of “Kemerer” in English.

    HERE LIES
    J. CONRAD SCHIDLER
    HE & ELISABETH HIS
    WIFE BORE 10
    CHILDREN HIS PARENTS
    ANDREAS & MARGARET
    HE DIED APRIL 20th
    1796 AGED 58 YEARS
    Text John Chap. II V. 25

    PAUL EBERHART

    ELISABETH
    LINSENBIGLER