History of Middlesex County, Massachusetts - citizen hylbom blog

404 HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY.
All adequate history of the town was projected
in 1865.
By invitation of many prominent gentlemen, snp-
pleniented hy vote of the town, Hon. Lilley Eaton,
a vahied citizen, long identified with tlie progres-
sive institutions and best prosperity of the town,
was intrusted with this congenial service, " to en-
rich the Present from the gleanings of the Past."
The labor grew upon his hands as his design for
the book enlarged to embrace in its scope the
whole territory and people of ancient Beading.
His sadden death, in January, 187^, left the work
nearly but not fully completed. A committee, of
which John S. Eaton, Esq., was the efficient chairman,
acting under authority of the town, carried
forward the work to its proper end, and in 1874
was printed, at the town's expense, the Gcnealorfical
History/ of the Town of Reading, Mass., indadhig
the present Towns of Wakefield, Reading, and
North Reading, with Chronological and Historical
Sketches from IGJO to IS?^.. This volume is oc-
tavo in size, containing 815 pages, embellished
with fifty portraits and engravings.
The Wakefield Band has become a valued insti-
tution of this comninnity, and worthily sustains,
on public occasions, the innsical reputation of the
town in stirring and harmonious strains.
The cemeteries of Wakefield are very interesting
in their associations and mementos.
The earliest graveyard was located in that por-
tion of the new Park Avhere lately stood the old
town-house and the house of Yale Engine Com-
pany.
Here for more than fifty years the first and second
generations of settlers buried their dead. The
present generation can easily recall the appearance
of the antique monuments and tablets that marked
the graves of the good and true fathers and mothers
of the town; but now, alas, no trace remains to
greet the fondly seeking antiquarian eye. Tiic ruth-
less hand of progress has levelled the hallowed site.
"Not even these bones fi-oin insult to pnitffi,
Willi uncouth rhymes and shapi'lcss sciilplnro docked,
Implores the passing tribute nt a siuli."
Vet ii kindly solicitude and vigilniirc has pre-
served in private archives most of thi' inscriptions
upon these ancient stones. Following is fine of
them —
:
"Here lyes the body of ('apt. Jonathan Toole, wliu de-
ceased in the i-l" year of his age, 1(578.
" Fi-icnds sure would prove too far unkind,
If, out of sight. Ihey leave hiin out of mind ;
And now he lyes, transform'd to native dust,
In earth's eold womb, as other mortals must.
It 's strange his matchless worth intomb'd should lye,
Or that his fame sliould in oblivion dye."
In 1688 the town erected its second house of
worship, and located it a few rods northwest of
the present Congregational Church in Wakefield ;
and around this second church, soon after its erec-
tion, in accordance with an ancient custom that
has made churchyards and graveyards synonymous
terms, the later inhabitants began to inter their
dead; and thus commenced their second burial-
yard, in recent years known as the " old burial-
ground." For more than one hundred and sixty
3'ears it was the chief ])lace of sepulture for the
town. Here rest the ashes of the greater portion
of its former inhabitants. Consequently it pos-
sesses a most lively though mournful interest, as
the place where many a noble and revered friend,
many a loved and beautiful form, has been covered
from sight but not from memory.
Following is the epitaph inscribed upon the
tombstone of one of the most eminent among tlie
early lights of church and town :
"In this Sepulchre is reposited the mortal part of the
Rev. Mr. William Hobby, A. ]\I., late Pastor (the sixth in
the order of succession) of the first church in the town of
Reading,— learned, vigilant, and faithful ; he was a preacher
of the word of God, deservedly commended for his pure
evangelical doctrine, replenished with erudition and piety,
together witb solid judgment and eloquence; being at
lengtli worn out witli studies and labors, and most acute
pains of long continuance, calmly resigning to the will of
his Almighty Father, and earnestly aspiring after the
Heavenly Habitation and Rest, he breathed out liis soul
into the hands of his Savior, June IS, Anno Christi 17()5,
^tat. 58 years. He left, to profit liis bereaved flock,
a written monument of sage advice, in which, though dead,
he speaks, in solemn strains."
—
In course of time the old burial-ground became
so fully occupied that the selection of eligible spots
for single interments was difficult, and for family
lots impossible; and, in consequence, there was or-
ganized in 1846 a private corporation under the
name of Proprietors of Lakeside Ccnu'tery, which
])urchased a tract of seven acres of land on the
westerly borders of Lake Quannapowitt, and laid
out the same in avenues, paths, arb(n-s, bowers, and
four hundred burial lots. On the lytli of October,
1816, the new Lakeside Cemetery Avas inibliely and
solemnly consecrated by appropriate services on
the romantic grounds selected, including addresses,
prayers, and original hymns. 1'iie following is one
of the hymns sung on the occasion —
: