Cataraqui United Church Cemetary: A resting place of Loyalist Methodists
(photos by Nancy Cutway)
September 2017
On the weekend of June 3-4, Cataraqui United Church held a celebration of its cemetery, now over 200 years old and the final resting place of numerous Loyalists including Michael Grass. The Cemetery Committee were hoping for volunteers to help clean and restore some stones, and for stories from some of the descendants of those buried there.
There is a good history of the church at http://www.cataraquichurch.org/historyoverview.html
[Left: Anne Redish UE attempts to read one of the older stones. The orange lichen is a major problem on many stones.]
Debbie Smithyman, Church School Director, also drew our attention to a lengthy article about the church on the website “FadedGenes: A Chronicle of the people of the Methodist Church in Canada”. See
[Above: It is suspected that Michael Herchmer’s stone has been re-cut at some point, since the lettering is deep and clear. Most 1809 burials are illegible.]
[Left: Most Loyalist-era stones look like this or worse: lichen and weathering make them difficult to read. Matilda was one of the five wives of Micajah Purdy, a Loyalist who operated a sawmill and grist mill in almost the location where this wife is buried. Purdy’s Mill Road is just south of this spot. Micajah and at least one other wife are buried across the road in the Cataraqui Cemetery, which is operated quite separately from Cataraqui United Church Cemetery.]
Unfortunately, stones such as this one which lies broken and flat beside the driveway are all too common.
Some monuments such as the McGuin family obelisk were erected much later than the actual burials. This one may have been installed around 1884 when there were centennial commemorations of the arrival of the Loyalists.
If you are descended from one of the numerous Loyalists buried in Cataraqui United Church Cemetery, you may wish to consider a donation of money or time to help restore or maintain your family heritage stones.