Much of the history of early Antigonish cemeteries has been lost to human neglect and time’s ravages. Early gravemarkers tended to be ephemeral remembrances, traditionally fashioned from wood or fieldstone. Antigonish County is dotted with many cemeteries, oftentimes family burial plots, hidden under a tangle of underbrush. The area provides the historian with a fascinating microcosm of monuments, from Tommy Young’s simple wooden crosses to the plain Antigonish cenotaph to the ostentatious zinc markers manufactured in St. Thomas, Ontario.

Some of the earliest stones in Antigonish County are located at Town Point, the original site of Antigonish. Here, those adventurous enough to stray off the beaten path will find a cluster of stones, some of which commemorate members of the Hierlihy family who played a pivotal role as Loyalist founders of the town. An early map, dating from March 1787, indicates that the original Loyalist grant at Town Point incorporated within its precincts an “Indian burying ground”. In the early 19th century, the main axis of burials in Antigonish shifted to what is now present-day Main Street. As early as 1805, “a small parcel of land” positioned on the “south side” of Main Street (near the Credit Union and Bank of Nova Scotia) served as the main cemetery for local Roman Catholics. Before the mid-19th century, most North Americans buried their dead around a central community building like a church or meeting house. Antigonish Roman Catholics were no exception. Their burying ground was situated in close proximity to a small chapel. In the 1820s, the original chapel was replaced by a more substantial structure called St. Ninian’s, erected on the north side of Main Street, in the vicinity of the present-day Ultramar and John Paul Centre. This wooden building, measuring 72 X 45’, could hold 800 people. The Old Catholic Cemetery expanded into the adjacent churchyard and remnants of its early tombstones are still visible today. According to Aaron D. Harrington’s plot plan, dated 1841, 184 plots were sold in the Main Street Cemetery; the standard fee was 10 shillings per plot. The last burial in this location occurred in 1877, although St. Ninian’s Cemetery near the main highway was operating by the late 1860s. One of the most dramatic burials at the old Catholic Cemetery was undoubtedly the interment of Bishop William Fraser, Bishop of Arichat. This revered cleric was buried on 6 March 1851, with no fewer than 1400 people in attendance. Later, despite his wishes to be laid to rest “in the sunshine among the people I love and served", he was removed to a vault under the main altar of St. Ninian’s Cathedral. Here his brick enclosure lies alongside that of a fellow Bishop, Colin Francis MacKinnon who died on 26 September 1879.

Evidence confirms that Protestant burials also favoured the Main Street location by the early 19th century. Records for St. James Presbyterian Church pinpoint 1804 as the earliest date for burials in St. James Cemetery. By the 1840s, the congregation agreed that the Church yard cemetery should be organized into systemmatic lots to be assigned to various members. In 1868, the cemetery reached its capacity with approximately 190 lots and a committee was appointed “to look for a suitable piece of land for a burying ground and to solicit other donations to join in purchasing and owning the same.” Cloverville Cemetery, with its commanding hill-top view, was selected as a more congenial setting for Protestant burials. By 1883 sections of the cemetery were sold to members of St. Paul’s Church of England congregation who had outgrown their own Church Street burying ground, a somewhat cramped burial space dating back to the 1840s.

The decision to move to Cloverville Cemetery was precipitated in part by health concerns in the 1860s. One Casket correspondent remonstrated against the “pernicious custom” of burials “in the heart of the town.” He conjured up the spectre of poisonous “exhalations”, polluted wells and visitations of cholera and typhus. He reminded readers that no fewer than 800 to 900 inhabitants lived within easy distance from five graveyards, all “very densely filled”: “Though it is far from my wishes to mar the sociable pleasures of the tea cup, yet it is no less true that no one in this Village is more than half that distance (100 to 140 metres) from a cemetery.”

The movement of Antigonish cemeteries to more pastoral, scenic settings echoed larger realities. As 19th-century North American sensibilities were awakened to the rigorous imperatives of the Public Health movement, the traditional burying ground, huddled in the shadow of the church, was abandoned for a separate, specialized landscape to accommodate the dead. New attitudes towards death also altered the cemetery landscape. As Victorians increasingly sanitized and euphemized death, the cemetery became a parklike setting, evoking hope and scenic beauty with its winding paths and rustic landscaping. The graveyard was relegated to a location, physically distanced from day-to-day life, where it would serve as both a showplace of affluence and a retreat for restful meditation. In this respect, Antigonish cemeteries mirrored mainstream cultural trends and middle class tastes.

Nineteenth-century tombstones also reveal much about the class hierarchies of the day. After all, the elite had Egyptian obelisks, classical urns and gothic vaults that showcased their wealth. Even the physical placement of stones had social significance. The most covetted locations were in close proximity to the tree-lined main avenues that bisected the cemetery. In early churchyards, the arrangement of markers tended to be irregular with little attention to alignment. There was no real premediated design as churchyards expanded as the need arose. Death date, rather than social status, tended to determine the layout of early cemeteries. The Victorian cemetery also epitomized a preoccupation with family. Dubbed by Philippe Ariès as “museums of family love”, the mid to late 19th-century cemeteries gave centre stage to the family plot. Reflecting the new-found importance of the nuclear family, the so-called “dynastic burial” or burial “with an extended family orientation” had immense appeal to middle and upper class North Americans. The wrought iron fences that often enclosed the family burial site were graphic expressions of this mentality. According to historian Colin Coates, Victorian cemeteries teemed with symbols of privacy, property and kinship. Paired stones sharing a single base were popular markers for siblings or married couples. Single graves were often relegated to the perimeter of the cemetery, “visually and physically segregated” from the family lots. Even the epitaphs of the day proclaimed the importance of family, specifically identifying familial roles—brother, sister, father, wife and most popular of all, mother.

Antigonish cemeteries also closely paralleled these developments. Both the Kirk plot in the Cloverville Cemetery and the McIntosh / McGillivray plot in St. Ninian’s Cemetery resonate with the Victorian ideals of family and worldly success. In fact, a visit to local cemeteries enables one to voyage through the 19th century and to see how the simple upright sandstone slabs of the early 1800s gave way to a proliferation of symbols of mourning ranging from obelisks to urns. The latter were potent images of familial and social status and the changing face of death. The eventual development of professional funeral management (1890s) and a public hospital (St. Martha’s Hospital 1906) would also signify a transformation in the drama of community life.