Taking a short break

For those of you who check in regularly, I thought I would do you a favour and let you know I won't be posting for about a week as I'm trying to catch up on another course. It's a course on historic places so it is still relevant to the Reilly Cemetery Project, but it has enough reading attached to keep me glued to my monitor for the rest of my natural life for some time. Interesting stuff though, and I hope it will prove beneficial to RC-- I'm actually finding it difficult to concentrate on the specifics of the readings as I keep mentally applying the points to RC. I must learn to not go down rabbit holes quite so easily.

Don't forget about the clearing day on June 2-- if you can help it would be much appreciated. Folks are meeting there about 9am and if the work crew is big enough it might not take all day to get 'er done.

Back in a week or so...

Clearance Day!

Hey All!

It's short notice I know, but there will be a second day of brush clearing at Reilly Cemetery on June 2, 2012. With about 40% of the cemetery to be cleared it's still a big job and many hands make light work so if you can spare a couple of hours or the day to help out it would be appreciated. It's also an opportunity to meet other people who have ancestors at Reilly Cemetery. I will not be there as I'm at the Ontario Heritage Foundation conference that weekend and I'm so sorry to miss the chance to meet more Rupert area people and descendants. Gloves and long pants are highly recommended!

Finally some pictures!

Hi All!

I'm giving uploading some pictures a shot. This first one is of a very large, very overgrown shrub (one of three actually) that is presently blooming its heart out at Reilly Cemetery, Rupert, QC. It looks like a snowball bush to me but if anyone has a different identification, please let me know!

This next shot is of the view out the front entrance, overlooking the lake. It was such a lovely day today! The third shot is of Solomon's seal in bloom. It only occurs in two places in RC (so far, I'm not done yet!), it is indigenous to North America and according to Wiki it was valued for medicinal purposes.

So today I, with the help of a friend, mapped the south east section of the graveyard-- no big finds but you can't have big finds every day or finding things would become far less exciting. Ok, I found a grouse nest, but that's not relevant, even if it was cool. No pics on that as I wanted to finish the square as quickly as possible so Mrs Grouse could get back to her five eggs. I've pulled back the string and removed the stakes from the finished area in anticipation of a clearance day (don't want people tripping over strings OR ripping out my stakes accidentally). It looks like there are some new perennials coming up in the centre area, I will have to watch to see what they are for certain and add them to my list. Busy day, nice day, effective day, and that coffee I grabbed in Wakefield on the way home tasted amazing.

A picture is worth a thousand words...

One of the frustrations of working with the Reilly Cemetery has been a lack of photographic evidence. I have been told of photographs of the site as it was but haven't actually seen any...until today. A reader was kind enough to send along a picture of a relative, taken in the early 1950s, standing by a monument. This is great because IF I can match the features in the background I might be able to identify which monument goes where and put a name to the grave! A big if, yes, but I'll be having a good look around tomorrow when I'm at the cemetery (after I do the less fun work first-- hunting and finding are my rewards for the bug bites, the scratches, the dirt and the incipient sun burn-- note to self, more bug repellent and more sun screen for the AKME Junior Archaeologist kit). My very great thanks for the picture JT! So folks, if you have pictures taken at the Reilly Cemetery that predate the consolidation of the monuments and before the pine trees were planted, I want to see them very much.

I've been asked several times about the location of the Presbyterian church that served the community before the brick church was built at Leslie's Corners in 1882. I've heard many different ideas of where it stood so I really cannot say with any certainty. So far I have not found anything physical evidence that would indicate its location, but the church is not the focus of my project so I haven't spent much time on it. I will keep looking, mostly out of curiosity, but I have neither the tools nor the education to do much more than walk about keeping my eyes peeled. I will go through the written records after the mapping is done and see if there isn't something more indicative than I have come across so far.

A note for the curious...unless someone specifically says to use their name on the Internet, I will not post the names of any contact, any volunteer, or any person who volunteers information as I feel that privacy is terribly important. I try to remember to cite published sources but I may miss some here and there; it's not an intentional omission.

Flowers of the field...

Today's cemeteries are very different than old ones like the Reilly Cemetery. In the 1880s it became fashionable to design cemeteries in such a way that mechanical means could be used to maintain grasses. Before then families would tend the graves of their dead on a fairly regular basis (maybe after church?) and being in the cemetery was fairly social. Some put iron or wood fences around graves, often graves were mounded up (especially early ones or those whose family could not afford a headstone), and planting flowering shrubs or perennials was pretty common. Modern cemeteries often have trees or shrubs in them but you don't often see the enclosures and mounds that get in the way of easy mowing. Around the turn of the century there apparently was a push to remove a lot of these features from graveyards to make it easier to maintain the grass. Makes sense but it made a lot of the distinguishing features disappear. Reilly cemetery is fairly level in much of its area and may have been smoothed to enable easier maintenance. Other areas appear to be considerably rougher and may not have been changed at all. I don't know what I will find in those areas just yet but there are a fair number of headstone bases in the rougher areas so we can be pretty sure there are people buried there.

That having been said traces have been left behind and these are very easy to see indeed. I'm referring to the plants that people used to decorate the graves of the dead. There are old tree stumps that might have shaded the cemetery in general but there are also flowering shrubs of several varieties, several large patches of lilies, and roses. The roses are thick and abundant and quite the barrier to the curious archaeology/history type person. I'm recording the location of the larger bits and have noticed a pattern developing where there is very little indeed in the centre and near the old entrance on the west side, but this central open area is flanked by three large flowering shrubs on one side and lilies on the other. These shrubs and lilies do not occur in the fields surrounding the cemetery. The roses are busy spreading out in all directions, including into the farmer's field, and are doing their very best to survive despite the deep shade of the pine trees planted in the 1980s. I've been keeping an eye out for plants of which I am not familiar and there have been a few new ones on me--and I've been gardening for a quarter century now. The roses are different to the wild roses with which I am familiar and remind me a great deal of an apothecary rose, but I will have to wait until they bloom and compare it to the apothecary in my garden. Towards the road there are honeysuckle, wild plum and hawthorn bushes. Hawthorne is not indigenous as far as I know, and was often planted in the Victorian era (edit June 12, 2012, apparently hawthore IS indigenous). Honeysuckle is an old fashioned favourite but you can still buy it easily enough at garden centres, but this bush is a fair size so it's not a young plant.

It must have been very pretty there years ago with the roses and lilies, honeysuckle and wild plum atop the hill with a view all around.

Rainy day

Today I and (name removed for privacy) arrived fairly early at RC to complete the SW corner mapping and to lay the SE grid. We got a fair bit done before the skies opened but didn't quite finish up. I'm thinking Monday and Tuesday next week might be good for finishing the SE grid and for documenting those grid squares. We also got a fairly accurate perimeter measurement (definitely trapezoidal ie neither square nor rectangle). Showing him around was cool in its way because it is his ancestors who are buried there, and so many of the interred would be relatives of one degree or another. The fencelines around the cemetery are interesting in that they don't meet quite like at a 4 corner junction, one set appears to be offset a little. This may reflect a past use of which I'm unaware; it may reflect nothing at all. I am guessing here but I wonder if maybe it reflects some of that old road I mentioned earlier and perhaps some usage related to the cemetery or church (like a place for the horses perhaps). I will probably never know but it is fun to speculate a little.

Volunteers and Grand Tours

Today was a great day! Another archaeology/local history afficionado came out and helped me lay out stakes, run string and record grid squares. We got about three times as much done as I dared to hope and I am so grateful. Most of the SW quarter of the cemetery is done now and tomorrow I hope to finish that bit off and move on to the south east section No great finds today at RC but the landowner came over and it was fantastic to pick his brain for a while and to get a tour of what was where on the farm way back when. I'm looking forward to following up some of the leads. I'll get a location on the large square he identified in the field next door-- so obvious once it's pointed out-- the landowner says was where the school was situated. No luck on the church yet.

Reilly/Riley/Rielly/Rilly

I've been asked about which spelling is the correct spelling for Reilly. In the course of going through the burial records I've come across many different spellings of Reilly and when transcribing those records I have gone with the spelling used by the signing family member or that was in common use at the time. Spellings, like language, change over time. In the earliest records there is a Moor with no e, and of course today there are a great many Moores in the Rupert area who may very well be descended from those without e's. A gentleman by the name of McDonald had two sons, one who used Mc and the other who used Mac. I'm not a genealogist and I am not as familiar with the local families as someone who lives there but you do have to wonder if McCorkill, McCordell, McCorkell, McKortel families aren't perhaps related. Literacy was also a factor as in early years a great many people, sometimes including the minister recording a rite, were less than comfortable with reading and writing. If the names sound familiar is is possible it may be the same family though it may be a different branch or a different point in time, or just a different person writing it down.

Not a great day

I suppose if I were the superstitious type the sight of a black cat in a graveyard would have been an obvious warning that yesterday was not going to be a great day. It was cold, wet, blustery and quite unpleasant but I got a fair bit done regardless. More strings, more stakes, more wet tape measures and more twigs in the face. In the NW corner of each grid square I've been removing lose vegetative debris down to the soil level to keep an eye out for changes to the surface composition. The mid section is mostly a dark sandy loam which I suspect is getting increasingly acidic due to the pine trees and their needles. The mid section is also fairly level, rising to the north east (it is a hill after all) and has some lumps and bumps and shallow hollows and troughs. I could read a lot into those hollows and troughs and lumps and bumps but that's not good practise. The grid I've been setting up has a way of providing visual points of reference that can make much more visible that which is rather subtle. There are rocks here and there and the presence of a rock doesn't necessarily mean anything in and of itself. But when you find a flat faced rock propped up by another rock, with the flat facing east and a faint mound in front of it that is more than a meter long, well you have to admit it makes one think. I would never have noticed this particular arrangement if the grid lines hadn't acted like neon signs. Is it a grave? Might well be, might well not be-- but it does make one think. OK, no surprise to find graves in a graveyard, right? I'm pleased because it helps to establish that there are still signs of some of the graves (if not many) and the extent of the graveyard. So why was yesterday not so great? I was fine while working hard running lines, pounding in stakes and raking pine needles but when I started recording the squares I stopped generating body heat about the time the temperature took a dive and the wind came up. I got pretty cranky at 4 hrs in and by the 5th hour decided I wasn't getting paid enough to do this (for the record, I'm not getting paid, in fact it cost me money to do this for my degree...), that and I was caring less and less about good documentation so I packed up and headed home. The black cat never did come over and say hi. Got home a little more than an hour later to a stack of emails that had to be dealt with NOW or it would put getting this project the official university blessing even further, digging out documentation that had to be found and provided NOW (remember I was cold and tired and sore and cranky already) but eventually I slayed the dragons, got everyone what they wanted and FINALLY got confirmation that I am well and truly finally registered to do this project for academic credit. Long day, I survived.

A bit of good news, this project seems to be generating some additional interest going by the emails I've been getting. I am not a genealogist and I don't have access to all the information that I've been asked about. I will do my best to direct enquiries to someone who can where possible.

Another day at Reilly Cemetery

For part of my project I am attempting to map out the Reilly Cemetery as it is today. The place has changed a lot over the years and there may not be as much to record as I might like but I'm giving it a shot. If you've driven by and seen fluttering bits of pink, it's the marking tape on the grid I've been setting up. The grid will help me record the site with some degree of accuracy though I'm doing this pretty low tech-- with measuring tapes and compass (my gps has proven to be not accurate enough--maybe it got dropped once too often) The map won't be perfect but it may be useful at some point. I'm also recording the locations and measurements of the headstone bases that are here and there around the site. With these I hope to maybe figure out which headstone or monument went with which base. There are two sets of identical bases so of course I won't be able to say which exact monument went with which base in those cases. Some of the bases appear to have been moved or jostled while others (so far at least) don't appear to have moved much at all. This will take a while so if you are around and interested, please do drop in and I'll be happy to show you around.

Just because it's written in stone...

doesn't make it so. The Reilly Cemetery has a number of headstones that were consolidated on to a cement pad decades ago by the Mitchell Family. The interesting thing is that there exists two lists of the headstones at Reilly Cemetery, one that predates the consolidation (Elliot 1972) and one that came after (Toll 1991 I believe). The lists don't match. I was told that the Shouldice headstones were moved to Rupert Union Cemetery, and since they are on Elliot's list and not Toll's we can surmise that they were moved in the interim period. No one mentioned that the Shannon headstone had been moved as well-- I found that headstone by happy accident at Rupert Union Cemetery when I was recording the Shoudice monuments. According to the records Mr Shannon was indeed buried at Reilly Cemetery. Local history and wisdom says that no bodies were moved, though I could check that through BANQ (thanks for that tip, CM!). In another case there is a headstone at Reilly Cemetery for a Mitchell who is buried on his farm according to the records but there isn't one for another Mitchell who is buried at RC.  And that's another point-- there are often far more people buried at pioneer cemeteries than there are markers (Martin 2005). This is why I went through all those records, to see if I could find out how many people were there, who was there, and who might have been forgotten. Another problem with trusting the information on headstones is that they are often created long after the death of the individual  (Martin  2005)or sometimes family members relied on others to record the information-- this leads to interesting spellings of names, incorrect dates, and perhaps even the wrong family member being commemorated at a given place. So this means that what you see in a graveyard really should be regarded as a starting point and not necessarily all there is to know about a burial.

My thanks to a reader who pointed out that Fairbairn Lake (as it is called on the topographical maps) is now known locally as Reilly Lake.

Where this all got started...

paragraph removed here due to privacy concerns.

The old cemetery has gotten quite overgrown over the years and we both thought that at some point we'd like to get back up to Rupert, QC to find out how big the cemetery is, who might be there, how it got its name and maybe do a bit of work to clear it. I started doing some reading back in October and visited the site for the first time in November with some local ladies who knew the area and could help me out. When the opportunity arose to work at the cemetery as part of my degree I jumped at the chance.

So here's a start on some of the information I've gathered...

The old cemetery sits on a hill overlooking Fairbairn Lake to the south and the Rupert Union Cemetery to the north. In the mid 19th century a community grew up around the lake and this cemetery served the needs of the largely Irish Protestant community, though at the time it was called the Lake Settlement or North Masham (Geggie 1999). Later the community moved to Leslie's Corners and at some point became known as Rupert (borrowing heavily from N. Geggie's books here). I haven't run across a reference to the settlement as Rupert before 1900 as of yet. Aerial photographs don't go back as far as one would like but there is one from 1926 that shows a road down by the water to the south west, then up and over the hill to the north and east; according to Geggie, it went over to a place called Concern Farm. There is what may be an old road bed running along the west side of the cemetery (on private property!) and it is possible that this is part of the old roadway. It's a lovely view from the top of the hill in both directions and it appears it was accessible by road so it's no surprise why the spot was chosen.

In the Methodist and Presbyterian records that I have gone through the cemetery was referred to as Riley Cemetery, the public cemetery at Masham, the Protestant cemetery at Masham or the cemetery at Masham. When I checked with a local historian and the Gatineau Valley Historical Society we agreed that references in English to Masham can refer to the Township of Masham or what is now called Rupert. Confused yet? There's a French speaking (St Cecile de Masham) Masham as well, predominantly Catholic, but as the Reilly Cemetery is a Protestant cemetery I think we can be sure that the records in English, especially relating to Protestant burials of English speakers, are referring to Masham/Rupert. Why the Reilly Cemetery? I have a record of  a burial (not a Riley) at the Riley farm in 1865 so it looks like the cemetery took the name of the landowner. I haven't cross checked this with land registry records yet. I have also been told that the land upon which the cemetery sits was in Reilly hands until about 50 years ago.

At this point in time I've gone through about 400 death records from 1853 to 1905 from the Methodist and Presbyterian Churches-- their records are not complete, there are years missing or with remarkably few entries.There is an issue too of just when Rupert Union Cemetery opened for use and when the Reilly Cemetery closed for good-- so far I don't have a firm date for either and I haven't seen a specific reference to Rupert Union Cemetery before 1911. This is curious as the land apparently was donated around 1900 (again I will have to check this with the land registry). At this point I'm only listing those (54 individuals) that predeceased 1900 and that specify place of burial there so as to prevent confusion. If I find out more I may have to change the list. Gatineau Valley Historical Society has a copy of my initial list, as does the Rupert Union Cemetery Board.

More later.

Just Getting Started...

Hello!

Welcome to the Reilly Cemetery blog. Bear with me as I get this figured out, set up and sorted out. I'm planning on describing my research into Reilly Cemetery, located in Rupert, QC and I welcome any comments or information you might have to add. If at all possible it would be best that you let me know what information comes from written records such as birth certificates, from compiled histories such as books, or what information comes from family histories.

So far I've been going through books about cemeteries in general, cemeteries in the Gatineau Valley of Quebec, Methodist and Presbyterian records (such as exist that is), and aerial photographs. I have put together a short list of those known to be buried at Reilly Cemetery and plan in the future to compile a list of those likely (but not guaranteed to be) buried there as well. Unfortunately the records are not always as complete as I'd like, and sometimes they are almost unreadable but I did the best I could though I cannot guarantee that I have not made errors along the way.

With the help of some wonderful volunteers  a work day was organized that cleared out much of the brambles that had engulfed the site. There may be a second work day to clear more of the brush and when a date is set I'll post it for those who are interested in lending a hand.

So if your name is  O'Hara, Ardies, Reilly, Moor, Mitchell, Shouldice, Fairbairn, Nesbitt, Johnston, Matchet, Thompson, Mahon, Chilcott, McKenna, McKortel, Kennedy, Wallace, Nelson, McMonigle or any of the other early Gatineau Valley settler names, you might have family at the Reilly Cemetery. I'll try to update frequently so drop in every now and then to see what's going on.

Lots to be learned, lots to be done.