The Research Committee Meets

Our brand-new research committee had its first meeting last week at the Diocesan Archives.  Here we see the Chairman, Tom Caswell, and docents and/or members Janet Jordan and Louise Kennedy.  The back of the head belongs to docent Sue Barrow.  Sister Catherine Bitzer, Diocesan Archivist, took the photo.

The Research Committee will facilitate and coordinate research into Tolomato Cemetery, the people buried there and even preservation and materials issues.  Tom has gotten it off to a start with an on-line archive in the University of Florida Digital Collections, where we will collect texts and even digital artifacts such as photos, videos,  etc.  At the moment, there’s not much in it, but that will change over time and we hope it will eventually be a valuable resource.

Techie Tolomato

Tolomato has moved into the 21st Century with its very own QR code!  For the less techie among us, a QR code is a symbol similar to a bar code that users of smartphones (I-phone, Droid phones) can use to go directly to a website or some other internet resource.  They must have a QR code reader app, and then they can take a picture of the QR code with their cell-phone camera, wait a couple of seconds, and see their phone’s browser immediately open the website indicated by the code.

 

The QR code is in the corner of the small sign at the front gate that shows the hours when the cemetery is open to visitors.  Because of the fence, it was a little difficult to get the sign into position so that the QR code was readable.  However, it seems to work, and we hope that it will give visitors another way to connect with us.  We will also put in on announcements of our Visitors Days and other events.

The NCPTT at Tolomato

A few weeks ago, we got a call about an exciting event to be held at Tolomato in April: an NCPTT workshop. For those who may not be familiar with this acronym, it refers to the National Center for Preservation Technology and Training, a government entity created in 1994 to promote preservation training and work on our national heritage sites. The group sponsors workshops all over the country, usually in conjunction with local universities and preservation programs and organizations. They focus on techniques and plans for assisting professional and non-professional organizations in maintaining historic properties .
In our case, the workshop will include the repair of stone markers, a plan for our plantings, and the lime washing of a stone grave enclosure.  It will be attended by preservation students from the University of Florida and Flagler College.



This large grave enclosure belonged to the Hernandez/Gibbs family, and the stele in the middle commemorates Ana Hernandez, who died in 1838. The underlying material is coquina, and as you can see from these photos, it’s not in very good condition.



The work will involve the careful removal of plant material (Florida’s persistent airplant and lichen) along with any loose pieces of the Portland cement that was used in the past to repair the original coquina and stucco. Once the surface is cleaned, several layers of limewash will be applied.

Limewash is a solution made of water and lime, which in St Augustine was obtained by burning oyster shells in a lime kiln.  While limewash can be thickened with various materials, in this case it will be thin and will be applied in thin coats, as many as ten of them. This will have the effect of sealing the porous stone under it. However, traditional limewash, made of natural materials, wears off under the assaults of weather and plant life and must be reapplied fairly often. Limewashing protects the fragile coquina stone, and when it wears off, as we see here, the coquina begins to weather and disintegrate.



Stay tuned to see the work on the grave enclosure. We’ll post photos as we get them.

Greene-Miller Cemetery, Cumberland Island, Georgia

Tolomato Docent Louise Kennedy recently made a trip to Cumberland Island, a Georgia location a couple of hours north of St Augustine that is now a national park and can be reached only by a once-a-day ferry. One of the attractions of the place, which was formerly a plantation and estate, is its little family cemetery.
The cemetery is about the same age as Tolomato, although it continued in use for several decades longer than Tolomto. You will notice similarities in the vaults and markers.  It was very common for people who lived on these somewhat remote plantations to maintain cemeteries on their own property rather than going into town to bury family members in the church cemetery.
Louise gave us this account, with its accompanying photos, and tells us the stories of some of the people buried there.

GREEN-MILLER CEMETERY, CUMBERLAND ISLAND, GEORGIA

By Louise Kennedy

This historic abandoned, slightly over-grown cemetery is located a little northeast of Dungeness, the old four story main house belonging to the Carnegie Estate on Cumberland Island, Georgia. Besides the visible headstones, there are also unmarked graves at the site.
Major General Nathanael Greene, of Revolutionary War fame, purchased the property at Cumberland Island on August 11, 1783. He died of sunstroke three years later and left the property to his wife, Catherine. She later married Phineas Miller, who had been the tutor to the Greene children, and who took over management of the farm. He died in 1803 and there is no marker for his grave. Catherine died in 1814, and the stone on her above-ground vault reads: “She professed great talents and exalted virtues.”
The property then passed to Catherine’s daughter Louisa, who was married to the plantation manager, James Shaw, a Scot. He died in 1820 and is buried under the table marker shown in the photo. The touching inscription reads: “Sacred to pure affection this simple stone covers the remains of James Shaw, His virtues are not to be learned from perishable marble but when the records of heaven shall be unfolded, It is believed then will be found characters as durable as the volume of eternity.”

Probably the best known person (formerly) buried at the Greene-Miller Cemetery is Henry “Lighthorse Harry” Lee, Revolutionary War general and the father of Robert E. Lee. He was a friend of Nathanael Greene. In 1818, while sailing north along the Georgia coast, he became ill and sought refuge at Dungeness. There, Louisa Shaw cared for him until his death on March 25 1818. Some hundred years later on May 28, 1913 Lee’s remains were removed to the campus of Washington and Lee University, Lexington, Virginia, where they were placed along side those of his son Robert E. Lee. His marker is still visible in the cemetery, accompanied by a marker explaining that the remains have been moved.
Plantation employees as well as family members are buried at the cemetery. In a separate area are the graves of the housekeeper Catherine Rikart and her husband. She was born on July 26, 1831 in Mulhouse, Alsace, France and died 12 May 1911. Thomas M. Carnegie erected the markers etched in stone which read, “In affectionate memory of faithful and loyal service…” Her husband’s marker has been broken off of its base, but the footstone has the initials J.R.   Family cemeteries like this give us a little glimpse into the lives of people on the isolated plantations of the day.

Christian Brothers

The graves at Tolomato Cemetery bear witness to the many different individuals and groups who have played their part in St Augustine’s history. But one that is often overlooked is the grave of Rev. Louis de Gonzaga, a Christian Brother who died in 1861.

Three Canadian members of the Christian Brothers, a teaching order, were brought to St Augustine by Bishop Verot in 1859 to run a school for boys. They lived in a house on Charlotte St. on the lot directly behind the modern Cathedral Parish School and ran their school in the building.  Below is what is thought to be a photo of the building, possibly taken in the 1870s.  The building was later used by the Sisters of St Joseph as their early school and residence shortly after they arrived in 1866.  After the Civil War, a number of recently emancipated African Americans settled in the area around the school.

The stay of the Christian Brothers in St Augustine was brief.  The Civil War broke out in 1861, and St Augustinians feared that their town would be targeted by Union troops because of its importance as a supply depot. Most of the boys in the Christian Brothers school were from the local area, although there were some who were boarders and had come from Georgia and more westerly areas of Florida.  The brothers were afraid that the older boys would come to harm if the town was attacked by Union forces, so they closed the school and made arrangements to get the boarder boys back to their families. 

They left for Jacksonville on the train, and stayed with the boys for a couple of days until their families could pick them up or they could be put on trains headed for their homes.  Then the Brothers themselves left Florida and returned to Canada and New York.

Except for one:  Brother Louis.  He died on July 17, 1861, probably not long before the Brothers left for the North, and was buried at Tolomato Cemetery. He was 35 years old. 

Just a few days ago, his grave received a visit from members of his “family,” the Christian Brothers.  Brother Timothy, from Louisiana, and Brother George, from California, were in St Augustine for a conference and came to visit Tolomato.  Here they are with the marker of Brother Louis, which as you can see is not very legible anymore. 

But fortunately Matthew Kear painstakingly transcribed it, and below is the text:

J.M.J.
Erected by the Catholics
of the city of St. Augustine
as a Tribute of respect for
the memory of Rev. Brother
LOUIS of G[onzaga] of the Order of the Brothers
of the Christian Schools
who departed this life July 17,
1861 aged 35 yrs. & 9 mons.
May he rest in peace. Amen.
Hail Mary.

Tolomato–Franciscan Mission Indian Village

 

As we know, the word Tolomato entered St Augustine’s geographical vocabulary in connection with a mission village of Guale Indians of that name, brought to St Augustine from South Georgia in the 17th century when they were forced to flee the attacks of other tribes. They first settled on what is now the Tolomato River, about 8 miles north of St Augustine, and our bishop at the time, Bishop Calderon of Cuba, reports visiting the village in 1675. 

The bronze map in the photo is at the Mission Nombre de Dios and shows the chain of missions that spread out from St Augustine.

After the British attacks of the dawn of the 18th century, in 1706, the Spanish governor issued a proclamation requiring the outlying mission villages to move closer to St Augustine.  The Tolomato Indians moved to a little strip of land between the city wall and Maria Sanchez Creek, a secure location where they could be protected by the soldiers stationed at the Santo Domingo redoubt.  They were served by Franciscan priests from the convento in St Augustine and lived at Tolomato until they, along with the other Spanish citizens, left for Cuba in 1763.  Their descendants now live in the area of Guanabacoa, part of Havana.

Below we see one of the murals painted by Hugo Ohlms at the Cathedral Basilica of St Augustine, depicting his conception of life in a Florida Franciscan mission.

What is the point of all this? In mid-March, Flagler College is going to host a conference on Franciscan Missions in the Borderlands, a term that refers to the borders between the English and Spanish territories in what would become the United States. You can view the abstracts of the sessions by clicking here:  Franciscan Conference Program.

St Photios Pilgrimage at Tolomato Cemetery

The original group of Minorcans who were brought to Florida in 1768 were not all from the island of Minorca, but included Sicilians, other Mediterranean peoples, and Greeks.  Dr. William Turnbull, the Scottish doctor who wanted to found an indigo plantation in what is now New Smyrna Beach, was married to a Greek woman from, of course, Smyrna.  They thought that Greeks would be able to tolerate Florida’s heat better than Northern Europeans, and set sail to recruit workers for the plantation.

They were able to get some settlers from Sicily, deposited them on Minorca, which was then under British control, and sailed to Greece. The Peloponnese Peninsula, particularly the region of Mani, yielded willing immigrants because the Greeks were under attack by the Turks in that area.  Others, such as Gaspar Papy, were recruited from Smyrna, and some from Crete and the Greek Islands.  But Turnbull was unable to get the number of workers he needed, so he sailed back into the Mediterranean, collecting more recruits along the way. He  decided to spend the winter in Minorca and found that some of his earlier Italian recruits had married Minorcan girls. Not only the girls but their families and other Minorcans, wanting to escape the extreme poverty of Minorca, would accompany Turnbull back to Florida.  He finally left with about 1400 people, some 400 of whom were Greeks.

The Greeks in the group, who were Orthodox but whose priests had been forbidden by the Turks to accompany them, were served by the two Catholic priests, Fr. Pedro Camps and Fr. Bartolome Casanovas, and when the Minorcans (including under this name the Greeks and Italians) came to St Augustine in 1777, they continued to be part of the community. When they died, they were buried in Tolomato Cemetery.

The Greek Orthodox Church has a pilgrimage to St Photios Shrine every year. The lovely, icon-filled shrine occupies the site of the building where Fr Pedro Camps had his church and where these early Greeks would have worshipped, and it is considered a memorial to the first Greek settlers on the American continent. 

On some occasions, the Greek pilgrims have a memorial service known as a Trisagion for the people buried at Tolomato Cemetery.  This year, the weather was numbingly cold and damp, but a hardy band appeared anyway with the pastor of Holy Trinity Greek Orthodox Church, Fr. George Ioannou, and stood in the old cemetery and sang the ancient chants in English and in Greek.