God's Acre Cemetery (also known as Salem Moravian God's Acre and Salem Moravian Graveyard) is a cemetery for the Moravian congregation in

Old Salem Old Salem is a historic district of Winston-Salem, North Carolina, United States, which was originally settled by the Moravian community in 1766. It features a living-history museum which interprets the restored Moravian community. The non- ...

North Carolina North Carolina ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern region of the United States. It is bordered by Virginia to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the east, South Carolina to the south, Georgia (U.S. stat ...

. It is located around north of the town's Home Moravian Church and also serves the thirteen member churches of Salem's congregation: Ardmore, Bethesda, Calvary, Christ, Fairview, Fires, Home, Immanuel New Eden, Konnoak Hills, Messiah, Pine Chapel, St Philips and Trinity. St Philips has a second cemetery in the northeastern corner of the adjacent Salem Cemetery. Burials are organized chronologically. There are no statues, only uniform white square headstones (20" x 24" x 4" for adults) laid into the ground, because Moravians believe that everyone is equal in death. The graves are arranged in line with the 18th-century choir format: men and boys are separated from women and girls. Family ties are not considered: the cemetery itself is considered a family plot. The first burial in the cemetery was John Birkhead in 1771. The first female burial was that of Eva Anna Berothin two years later. As of 2023, the cemetery contains over 6,000 burials. The older cemetery entrance is via Cemetery Street, to the north. The more modern eastern section is accessed from the west by Cedar Avenue, which is a narrower extension of Church Street, or from the east via East Salem Avenue. The first sign greeting visitors arriving past Cedarhyrst, a Gothic Revival house at the southern gate of Cedar Avenue, reads "I Know That My Redeemer Liveth", which is taken from the

Book of Job The Book of Job (), or simply Job, is a book found in the Ketuvim ("Writings") section of the Hebrew Bible and the first of the Poetic Books in the Old Testament of the Christian Bible. The language of the Book of Job, combining post-Babylonia ...

, chapters 19 to 25. Several similar signs continue up the Cedar Avenue hill.

Today

Each Saturday before

Easter Easter, also called Pascha ( Aramaic: פַּסְחָא , ''paskha''; Greek: πάσχα, ''páskha'') or Resurrection Sunday, is a Christian festival and cultural holiday commemorating the resurrection of Jesus from the dead, described in t ...

, the members of the Salem congregation churches decorate the graves with flowers. An Easter Sunrise Service is held the following day, in the 1970 addition of the cemetery to the east, continuing a tradition begun in 1735 in

Herrnhut Herrnhut (; ; ; Upper Lusatian: ''Harrnhutt'', ''Harrnutt'') is a town of around 6,000 inhabitants in Upper Lusatia, in the district of Görlitz, in eastern Saxony, Germany. The town is mainly known as the place of origin of the community of t ...

, Germany, and first observed in Old Salem in 1772. On Easter morning, the congregation attend as the "Church Militant" to affirm their faith in the "Risen Lord."

Notable burials

* Christian Gottlieb Reuter (1717–1777), architect * Melchior Rasp (1715–1785), stonemason * Christian Triebl (1714–1798), carpenter * Elisabeth Oesterlein (1749–1802), educator * Anna Johanna Krause (1756–1815), first child born in

Bethabara Al-Maghtas (, al-Maġṭas, meaning or ), officially known as Baptism Site "Bethany Beyond the Jordan", is an archaeological World Heritage Site in Jordan, on the east bank of the Jordan River, reputed to be the location of the Baptism of Jesu ...

* Rudolph Christ (1750–1833), potter * Christian Winkler (1766–1839), baker * Don Cardwell (1935–2008),

Major League Baseball Major League Baseball (MLB) is a professional baseball league composed of 30 teams, divided equally between the National League (baseball), National League (NL) and the American League (AL), with 29 in the United States and 1 in Canada. MLB i ...

pitcher *

George Hamilton IV George Hege Hamilton IV (July 19, 1937 – September 17, 2014) was an American country musician. He began performing in the late 1950s as a teen idol, switching to country music in the early 1960s. Biography Hamilton was born in Winston-Salem, ...

(1937–2014), musician *

Howell Binkley Howell Bagby Binkley (July 25, 1956 – August 14, 2020) was an American lighting designer in modern dance and musical theatre. He received the Tony Award for Best Lighting Design in a Musical for ''Jersey Boys'' in 2006, and again in 2016 for ' ...

(1956–2020), lighting designer File:Salem Moravian God’s Acre, 2025-03-01.jpg, Cedar Avenue entrance File:Old-salem-coffee-pot north-carolina us - 51621223502.jpg, A view from just inside the western gate on Church Street

References

External links

*{{official website, http://www.salemcongregation.org/the-salem-moravian-graveyard-gods-acre/
God's Acre Cemetery, Old Salem
– Find a Grave Cemeteries in North Carolina Moravian Church cemeteries 1771 establishments in North Carolina Cemeteries established in the 1770s

Today

Notable burials

See also

References

External links