The Vermont watchman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1883-1911, 1909-12-23

town Wnen HrSJ SeIIleu' nv ucd'h
occurred from any cause within its
borders for four years and seven
months after Col. Jacob Davis first
pitched his tent near the banks of the
North Branch, in 1887. In the per-
iod from the first settlement of the
town to 1900 only sixteen deaths oc-
Cured. Theophilus Brooks, the first
person who died in Montpelier, was
drowned. 1t was not until 1897 that
an adult of the town died a natural
death. Theophilus Brooks was drown
ed in 1891. In the next two years
there were no deaths in the town.
Five infants died IN the next two
years and in 1896 there were no
deaths. OF the sixteen deaths prev
ious to 1900 three were due to acct
dent and eleven were those of child
rem less than six years of age.
While this is a very small number
of deaths and a small percentage even
of the early inhabitants, the record
should not be surprising, for it must
be remembered that the men who came
up here to subdue the wilderness and
make themselves homes were young
or in the prime of life hardy, vigor-
Gus, Injured to hardship and exposure,
men for whom the wilderness had no
terrors and to whom we would con-
slider hardships were a part of every
day life.
Montpelier has always had, has to-
day, a small death rate, but it was
much smaller, would necessarily be
much smaller, among hardy COM
pany of adventures living an out
door life amid surroundings uncon-
taminated by civilization.
First Burying Ground.
Yet there were deaths and the dea|
must be provided for. Private and
family burying grounds were not I'M
common, though they were by no
means so frequent as in Maine or
Massachusetts. So, early in the his
to b of the town, in 1894, to be exact,
at a special town meeting called at
the same time and place as the free
mans meeting, the committee appoint
ed the previous March to purchase
and clear public burying ground, re-
ported that they had purchased of
Joseph Wing two acres of land for
said purpose, at fifteen shillings per
acre, lying on the road that leads from
Col. Davis to Calais, and have fell
the timber on the same"
The report does not state whether
these were York or English shillings,
Bbut reckoning either way the price
\ seems to have been, if not exorbitant
at least entirely ample, ror wild land
which must be cleared, for the COM
mittee report that they have fell
the timber. This is no place to cast
reflections and it would be altogether
improper, with no special knowledge
of surroundings or conditions, to sug-
gest that there was graft in those
days or that the price of land to be
sold to the town was greater than
when it was to be disposed of to indi-
viduals. Yet, with "all OUTDOORS" be-
fore them it does seem as If the
price the few inhabitants of the town
paid in 1894 for their first buryine
ground was excessive. But it is not
for us at this time to condemn, for
there may have been some compen-
sating advantages that are not men
toned in the report.
Furthermore, the Joseph Wing from
whom the cemetery was bought was
the great grandfather of Geo w. and
,.John G. Wing and grating does moi
run in the family. To be sure George
w was removed from his position as
one of the directors of the State Hos
pital for the Insane in one of the
spasms of virtue the State OCCASION
ally experiences, but the nearest ap'
lroach to grating in his case brought
ut by that investigation was thai
might have had one cabbage raised
the State Hospital farm.
Let it stand, therefore, that the frs
bic burying ground of the town D
Montpelier was bought seven years
after the first settlement of the town
at a cost of thirty shillings and tina
the town cleared the timber from thu
land.
The old burying ground has lont
ago been abandoned. The origina
report does not make it at all plaiI
where it was located. Thompson, il
his history written in 1859, says HI
has learned from sources independ
ent of this singularly indefinite des
, sription of the committee" that tn
cemetery was in the angle forme'
by the roads passing to North Mont
pelier and to Calais, as they diyid
on the swell beyond the brook abou
one hundred rods northeast of tn
Meeting House at Montpelier Center.
There is no trace of the old bury
ing ground today and has not bee
for a generation. Col. Davis house
the residence of Pearley Davis, after
ward General Davis, still stands, nc
far from the Meeting House" to whic
Thompson refers, but that gives n
g.,