Baxter Springs news. [volume] (Baxter Springs, Kan.) 1882-1919, 1893-05-20
STORY OF A CEMETERY.
ITS Decay a Suro Sign Of Wash
ington's Progress.
Ann Casanavc's Request TO the Archbishop
OF baltimore - why Cardinal Gibbons
Is Anxious to Dispose OF tho
Old Burial Ground.
SPECIAL Washington letter.

Although no human being was in
sight | seemed to hear voice pro-
claiming: Take off thy shoes, for the
place whercon thou standcst is holy
ground" All around were tombstones,
few of them remaining where they
had been erected by the friends of the
departed, but scores of them scattered
about lying fiat upon the ground, all of
them ancient, many broken and de-
faced. Quite number of graves had
been opened and the remains taken
away, but many of them remained
.undisturbed with little mounds above
them.
A new street had been cut through
the place. Upon the border of what will
soon DC n pavement the ground had
been spadcd away and there were en-
posed the empty halves Of graves which
were once occupied by the bodies of men
and women. Only two decades ago the
section was regarded as almost beyond
the city limits. And yet within three
blocks of it the cable cars have been
running with noisy sound and jangling
bells for nearly three years past.
You know that all the streets in this
city are numbered in one direction and
lettercd in another direction. When
Grover Cleveland was president before
r. street was unused and unknown
east of Fifth street. Last year it was
extended for more than u mile, and in
walking out the newly-eXtendcd and
ooncrcted street | came upon this
graveyard. Although had lived many
years in Washington the existence OF
this cemetery had been unknown to
me, and upon inquiry among friends
who have long resided in this city, no
body seemed to enlighten me rs to the
name of il, when it was consecrated,
or give any information concerning it
whatever. But to-day its history ap-
pcared in an evening paper
James, Cardinal Gibbons, of Balti-
more. has filed n bill against J. II.
Young and eighteen others. heirs of
Ann Casanave, suing as the holder of
certain real estate in the District of
Columbia, to be authorized to be able
to dispose of the same free from any
cloud or trust thereon. This bill al
leges that in 1908 Ann Casanave con-
veyed the land to John Carroll. arch
bishop of the diocese of Baltimore, for
the use of the Roman Catholics of
Washington as graveyard. to be used
by the two congregations of Roman
Catholics then existing in Washington,
that the land has since been occupied
as graveyard, though no intermcnts
have for a long time been made there
in. and that by conveyance the land
has become invested in the present
archbishop of Baltimore.
1t is further laid out in this bill that
the district commissioners have cx-
tended Il street through the cemetery,
and that all the bodies on the line of
the street have been removed to Mount
Olivet cemetery; that $500 land dam
ages have been awarded by the city
for the land taken, whereon the Casa
nave heirs have claimed the $500 and
tied IL up in the hands of the district
commissioners, who have filed an in
terpleader in order that they may be
informed by the court to whom they
should pay the money. In this bill
Cardinal Gibbons submits to the court
that he has no personal interest in the
premises. and that if he cannot law
fully or vnlidly take bodies from the
cemetery, he is to continue its in
closure as far us possible and to main
tain it as graveyard, as it now is; but