John Borodell Denison

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Photo by Midge Frazel, taken 23 May 2004.

Gravestone in a Rock

In May of 2004, nearly 10 years ago, I embarked on a mission to locate the cemeteries where my ancestors were buried. I was still a fledgling gravestone photographer then but as I bought my first digital camera in 1999, I had already moved on to a smaller lightweight camera a Sony DSC-P32. 

I remember this day quite fondly, we were driving through Mystic, CT trying to find out where we could eat dinner that was not too close from the hotel we were staying at. I was looking out the window and exclaimed, "OMG, stop the car"!

Hubs was not used to that then and he turned the car around and went back to find a spot to park near this little cemetery right on the water in the cove. We parked in the parking lot of a business, I grabbed the camera and walked over to the front of the cemetery where there were steps. I took a photo of the sign and the plaque on the stone wall and walked right up to this rock. I knew this was my ancestor since I had already worked diligently on this line so that I could make the most of my trip. It was 4:55 PM and I took only a few photos as the light was low, and I didn't want to use the flash.

In August of that year, I went to my first Denison Family reunion and asked about the cemetery. They directed me to Fred Burdick and he told me he was making CDs of all the oldest burying grounds that he had located and that I could have a copy. Since that time, he has photographed a lot of cemeteries and has shared them with me. I went on an adventure one day with him, all over Stonington and had a great time. I guess I will never run out of gravestones to blog about.

This photo was shared via Picasa. I have renewed my Flickr membership but they are not allowing easy sharing of photos so I am looking for other ways to do so.

John Borodell Denison (1646-1698) and his wife Phebe Lay (1650/1- 1699) were my 7th great grandparents. This is an original gravestone. Whether it was always embedded in this rock, I do not know.  Here's a clip of the Hale Cemetery listing from page 176 for this cemetery (Denison Burying Ground #19)

Tombstone Tuesday: Avery Denison

Tombstone Tuesday; April 1, 2014 April Fool's Day

Bullet Holes in Gravestone: Avery Denison

How dare they use my ancestor's gravestone for target practice?

Photo by Fred Burdick 2 Feb 2003, used with permission

Photo by Fred Burdick 2 Feb 2003, used with permission

In 2003, my cousin, Frederick E. Burdick, located and photographed two small family cemeteries in North Stonington, Connecticut. He reported at the annual Denison Society reunion that he had located these tiny Denison cemeteries and that a person had use Avery Denison's gravestone for target practice. I was horrified. I had been taking gravestone photos for about a year and had begun to study as part of my professional work as a genealogist.

Fred, now the Town Historian for Stonington, Connecticut, published his cemetery photos and research on CD making the profits available to the various family societies. He has given me permission to use any of his photos in my work. He tells me a neighbor on the street where this cemetery is located told him the "shoot the gravestone" story.

It is no April Fool's coincidence that I chose this gravestone for today's post. I went looking for a photograph I had not used before and who was either born or died in April. 

Photo by Brian Zoldak, 16 Mar 2014, used with permission
Look how much this stone has deteriorated!
But you can read the epitaph better...

Avery's name is significant because of the eleven children in this family, his mother chose my ancestor to bear her maiden name as a first name. (No, he did not start the company that makes the paper products we use today but that is a related family line. I wish I got free labels.)

In part, this slate gravestone reads:

In memory of Mr/Avery Denifon who/died April 3d, 1775. in/ye 63d year of his age.

The Hale Cemetery (transcription) record (North Stonington Cemetery #5 Denison Cemetery, p. 3) reads: 

Denison, Avery, died April 5, 1775 age 62 

Examine these cropped and lightened sections of the stone:

Does the numeral 5 look different than the date of 3 and the age of 63? The serif on the 5 goes to the right and the serif on the 3 goes to the left. Think about how you learned to write numbers.

The absence of a birth and death date in the vital record makes this more of a problem. 

If I had just looked at the Hale Index, I might have questioned the dates. It is time to learn more about the Hale Transcription Project and why they might be useful and why they might be wrong.