Tombstone Art Served A Purpose In Its Time

By Nancy K. Crevier

The Newtown Village Cemetery is a trove of primitive art, to look at the tombstones that mark the graves of those who perished here in the mid- to late 1700s.

Grimacing skulls with wings that flair behind the head seem unsettling decorations for a gravestone, presiding over the grave site with hollow eyes that seem more like something from a Harry Potter novel than an ancient burial ground. But according to town historian Dan Cruson, they are a reflection of the Puritan attitude toward death and resurrection dominant in the mid-1700s. Somewhat crude in their portrayal, the “death’s head” carvings were the works of various stone artists in New England and served as a warning, not to the dead, but to the living.

“It was not unusual for people of that time to spend the hours between church services in the cemetery,” said Mr Cruson. “As a matter of fact, they were encouraged to do so, and to reflect on their lives and be reminded that death is what lies in store for them. During the 1700s and earlier, there was no guarantee of the soul’s salvation, so the living needed to be on guard that they lived their lives righteously,” said Mr Cruson.

That most early grave inscriptions begin “Here lyes ye body of…” is no coincidence, either, explained Mr Cruson. “This was a meditational device, again, something for people to ponder while they were here. It is a body under the ground, and these were considered ‘burial grounds,’ not the more softened, later term of ‘cemetery,’ which means ‘sleeping place,’ a gentler phrase.”

Other 18th Century tombstones in The Village Cemetery depict more cherublike faces atop the stones. They range from round-faced, scrawny-winged carvings to solemn, square jawed faces with beanielike crowns perched atop their heads. Fanciful scrolls and florals meander down the shoulders of the stones and the droll faces evoke more thoughtfulness than fear.

With the “Great Awakening” in 1725, Mr Cruson said, there was a change in religious thinking. It took many years for the new thinking to trickle down from Massachusetts into Connecticut, but eventually the rigid, Puritan way of thinking gave way to a gentler religious attitude that placed more emphasis on resurrection. The kinder, cherub faces on grave stones in the 1700s represented the triumph of the soul, not so much a warning, as had the death’s head, said Mr Cruson.

Found on only a few of the Newtown headstones, but not uncommon, was the inclusion of the hourglass. Author Harriette Merrifield Forbes notes in her book Gravestones Of Early New England And The Men Who Made Them 1653–1800 that the Puritans universally recognized this symbol of the flight of time. “Even the children, who had watched eagerly as the sand slowly ran down in the big glass on the minister’s pulpit, knew that there finally came a time when it was all heaped up in the lower half….” Less frequently seen, but often in the accompaniment of the death’s head, was the symbol of the cross and bones, another gruesome reminder to the living of the fleetingness of life.

There is very little in the way of verse on any of the early 18th Century gravestones in the local cemetery, but the book Epitaphs To Remember by Janet Greene records numerous examples of epitaphs of the era from other New England cemeteries that accurately represent the Puritan state of mind.

He that was sweet to my Repose

Now is become a stink under my Nose.

This is said of me

So it will be said of thee.

So reads the headstone of a Dr Isacc Bartholomew, 1710, who lies beneath the sod in Cheshire, Conn. Daniel Noyes, 1716, of Newbury, Mass., left upon his tombstone this warning to his progeny:

As you were, so was I

God did call and I did dy

Now Children all whos name is Noyes

Make Jesus Christ

Your only choyes.

Yet another dire warning is issued from the great beyond by Josiah Lyndon of Newport, R.I., 1709, whose epitaph reads:

Behold and See

For as I am Soe shalt Thou Bee

But as Thou Art

Soe Once Was I

Bee Sure Of This

That Thou Must Dye.

As Puritan ethics began to crumble ever so slightly at the edges, engraved images were allowed on the tombstones of those who could afford the costly skill of a stonecutter. An epitaph carved in the stone could stand as a warning to the educated who were able to read, but for the unlearned, writes Ms Forbes, the carvings made clear the admonishing text: “…all could understand the meaning of the death’s head, the coffin, pickaxe, and spade, and the more comforting cherubim and scenes of resurrection…. What they saw at a glance, we can understand only by delving below the surface of hunting through some forgotten book.”

Whatever they represented, so primitive by today’s standards are these depictions, though, that it would seem they were the work of anyone handy with a stonecutting tool and willing to mark a settler’s grave. This is not the case, however, said Mr Cruson. Stone carvers known throughout the New England area were responsible for the folk art carvings that stare from headstones sculpted in the early days of Newtown. Artists can be identified by their particular styles, and for the families who could afford a marker, area stone carvers were valued for their skills.

“There are probably far more unmarked graves in this cemetery than there are marked graves,” wagered Mr Cruson. “A tombstone was very expensive, costing a family about the equivalent of two and a half oxen. Many families could not afford a tombstone.”

Trademark Stone

The type of stone used for the tombstone is helpful in identifying artists in The Village Cemetery, said Mr Cruson. “If it is slate, it is from Boston. Caleb or Nathanial Lamson from Boston are responsible for many of the18th Century gravestones here.” The death’s head carved by a Lamson is known by its arched eyebrows over the hollow eyes, and the lightly incised relief on the wings. Highly stylized shoulders on the gravestone speak of a Lamson work, as well, as does an ornate upper lip over the teeth.

Nathaniel and Caleb Lamson were the sons of famous Boston stonecutter Joseph Lamson, who died in 1722. “From 1722 to 1767 these two brothers had almost a monopoly of their kind of business in Middlesex County as well as furnishing many stones for Boston, New Hampshire, Connecticut, and Long Island,” states Ms Forbes in her book. So it is not surprising to find their artistry on stones that pepper the older graves in Newtown.

Other works in the older burial grounds of The Village Cemetery appear to be the work of the Lamson family, said Mr Cruson, but subtle differences mark them as copies. The relief on the wings may be less apparent, and in some cases, the skull has no eyebrows over the staring eyes. These copies, generally on a lesser quality slate, were “cheap imitations,” Mr Cruson explained, and tell a bit about a family’s circumstances, too.

Brownstone, a type of sandstone particular to areas of Connecticut, was widely available in the 1700s, and was used for a great number of the Newtown tombstones. James Stancliff was probably the most local carver, having moved from the Cromwell area to Southbury in the mid-1700s.

A September 2002 article in The Chronicle of the Early American Industries Association, Inc by Alison Guinness states that Mr Stancliff was an English stonecutter who “probably arrived in the colonies by way of Boston and maintained his connections to that city. Stones that can be attributed to him have a large geographical distribution in the Connecticut Valley… Stancliff’s style was distinctive. If all stones with canopied A’s are those of James Stancliff, then he was the first in Connecticut to depict a skull on tombstones. Before this, there was little decorative work on gravestones, usually only lettering, because Puritanism did not allow images of any kind.”

He utilized local brownstone for his creations, and his square-jawed heads that crown many Newtown graves of that time feature the “hook and eye” style. This serious cherub has wings that sprout out of the top of the head and a tiny crown floats above the hairless head.

The fancy hair and very angelic features of cherubs are the hallmarks of carvings by John Just Geyer. Heavily outlined eyes, ornate, sweeping wings, and pouty lips are characteristic of a Geyer stone, said Mr Cruson. One such example, on the 1773 tombstone of Caleb Baldwin, denotes the prosperity and standing of the family at the time of Mr Baldwin’s death. “This was a very, very expensive tombstone, not for everybody,” Mr Cruson said.

Another example of Mr Geyer’s work marks the resting place of Lemuel Camp, another leader in the fledgling Newtown community, who died in 1784. Here the telltale little Geyer forelock that drops down from the hairline onto the forehead is very apparent.

The 1758 gravesite of Mr Baldwin’s wife, Mehetabel, sports a far less elaborate carving attributed to John Gaud of Milford. “It is crude, but wonderful,” said Mr Cruson of the face. Puny wings jut out from the sides of an extremely large and round head, most of which is taken up by an enormous nose beneath heavily lidded eyes. Beneath the cherub head, a row of long-petaled rosettes mark the work as a Gaud creation, as do the simple vines that run down the shoulders of Mrs Baldwin’s headstone. The lightly incised top layers are carved through just enough to show the darker underlayer of the stone, making her stone a bit more unusual than the others of that era, Mr Cruson pointed out.

It is certain that one stonecutter was responsible for the carvings that Mr Cruson has nicknamed “Aztecs.” Though unidentified, this stonecutter created faces in which an elaborate crown soars from the top of the head, above a row of hair. The wings spread out from midway on the head. A similar face on a stone that long ago gave way to the march of time, in which the chin is more pointed and the features more wide set, was probably the work of an imitator, said Mr Cruson.

Just as the cherub faces denoted a new perspective on death, so too did the words that are engraved upon the stones of the later 1700s. It is at this time that the term “In Memory Of” is more frequently selected than the grim “Here Lyes Ye Body,” once so popular.

As the Victorian era approached, the stony tombstone countenances that scolded the living gave way to the less rebuking designs of urns and willows, florals, and vines. But nearly 300 years later, those primitive artworks continue to conjure curiosity, if not a feeling of some unease, for those who take the time to visit the southwest portion of The Village Cemetery. The lips may remain tightly closed, but the faces speak volumes.