The General Protestant Cemetery is an historic

cemetery A cemetery, burial ground, gravesite or graveyard is a place where the remains of dead people are buried or otherwise interred. The word ''cemetery'' (from Greek , "sleeping place") implies that the land is specifically designated as a buri ...

located in St. John's,

Newfoundland and Labrador Newfoundland and Labrador (; french: Terre-Neuve-et-Labrador; frequently abbreviated as NL) is the easternmost province of Canada, in the country's Atlantic region. The province comprises the island of Newfoundland and the continental region ...

. It is located on the side of the shallow

Waterford River "Waterford remains the untaken city" , mapsize = 220px , pushpin_map = Ireland#Europe , pushpin_map_caption = Location within Ireland##Location within Europe , pushpin_relief = 1 , coordinates ...

valley and is bounded on the upper (north) side by Old Topsail Road and on the lower side by Waterford Bridge Road.

History

Located between Waterford Bridge Road and Old Topsail Road in St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador, the General Protestant Cemetery officially opened May 25, 1849. Burials within the St. John's city limits were forbidden by 1849 due to the passing of "An Act to Prohibit Interments within the Town of St. John's", making the General Protestant Cemetery, then on the outskirts of town, a desirable area for burials. It was once referred to as the River Head Cemetery. The cemetery is designed as a Victorian garden cemetery with many of the oldest trees in the city. The earliest marker in the cemetery is for John Butt who died May 15, 1842. It appears that this person had likely been buried in another cemetery and then later moved to the General Protestant Cemetery after it opened. The opening of the cemetery coincided with the establishment of the first commercial headstone and memorial companies on the island, and the cemetery contains stones carved by early professional makers such as Alexander Smith, Charles Muir, and

Frederick George Chislett Frederick George Chislett (c1880 -1 January 1928) was a Newfoundland-born athlete, tombstone designer, carver, and businessperson. He was one of the first funerary monument entrepreneurs on the island to develop means for rural customers to place o ...

. Possibly the earliest signed headstone in the province is in the cemetery, carved by maker James Grey for someone who died in 1836 (another possible reburial). While the cemetery is primarily used and intended for Protestant burials, it also contains plots for those of other faiths. These include plots for members of the

Salvation Army Salvation (from Latin: ''salvatio'', from ''salva'', 'safe, saved') is the state of being saved or protected from harm or a dire situation. In religion and theology, ''salvation'' generally refers to the deliverance of the soul from sin and its c ...

Judaism Judaism ( he, ''Yahăḏūṯ'') is an Abrahamic, monotheistic, and ethnic religion comprising the collective religious, cultural, and legal tradition and civilization of the Jewish people. It has its roots as an organized religion in the ...

Buddhism Buddhism ( , ), also known as Buddha Dharma and Dharmavinaya (), is an Indian religion or philosophical tradition based on teachings attributed to the Buddha. It originated in northern India as a -movement in the 5th century BCE, and gra ...

, and

Taoism Taoism (, ) or Daoism () refers to either a school of Philosophy, philosophical thought (道家; ''daojia'') or to a religion (道教; ''daojiao''), both of which share ideas and concepts of China, Chinese origin and emphasize living in harmo ...

. Circa 1988, 50 plots on the southwest corner of the cemetery were given to the local

Muslim Muslims ( ar, المسلمون, , ) are people who adhere to Islam, a monotheistic religion belonging to the Abrahamic tradition. They consider the Quran, the foundational religious text of Islam, to be the verbatim word of the God of Abrah ...

community; by 2013 there were only 3 or 4 open Muslim plots remaining. By the 1940s, plots were becoming scarce, and the main cemetery for those of Protestant faith became the Mount Pleasant Cemetery on Hamilton Avenue. The cemetery is still in limited use today, though the majority of the plots that remain are family-owned.

Burials

Chinese

There are twenty seven Chinese graves in the General Protestant Cemetery marking the burial sites of early Chinese immigrants to St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador. Newfoundland and Labrador did not have a large Chinese presence until the late 19th century, and they predominately worked in hand laundries. The graves all belong to men. Due to the Chinese Head Tax of 1903 and a Chinese exclusion act of 1906, immigration from China was restricted to men and from the same region of southern China. The headstones in this section show a mix of English and Chinese inscriptions. These inscriptions show that all those interred in the cemetery were from Guangdong, a southern province in China. Some of the headstones appear with romanized names of those interred. It is not known how these individuals received romanized names, though some speculate that Anglicized names were used to make their names more recognizable and pronounceable to the English-speaking population of St. John's. Some of the members are given English nicknames, and one burial is recorded as "Jack Chinese." These early Chinese burials represent a highly Christianized practice, and may reflect not only a temporary strategy to be accepted into their new community, but also as a new way of life. The graves include that of murder victim Eng Wing Kit, who was killed in St. John's in 1938.

Notable interments

The cemetery is the final resting place of poets Margaret Peace and

Isabella Whiteford Rogerson Isabella Whiteford Rogerson (3 January 1835 – 2 February 1905) was a Newfoundland poet and philanthropist who also wrote under the Caed Mille Failtha and Isabella. Early life Born in County Antrim in 1835 to Alexander Whiteford, a watchmaker, ...

, as well as early social activist Mary Mann Pitts. Also buried in the cemetery is Patrick Tasker, a Scottish immigrant who was involved in community life and instrumental in setting up both

freemasonry Freemasonry or Masonry refers to fraternal organisations that trace their origins to the local guilds of stonemasons that, from the end of the 13th century, regulated the qualifications of stonemasons and their interaction with authorities ...

and a public health board in St. John's.

References

External links