HISTORY: EARLIEST CEMETERIES, FAYETTE COUNTY, KENTUCKY

Transcribed from History of Lexington Kentucky
Its Early Annals and Recent Progress
By George W. Ranck
Publ: Cincinnati, Robert Clarke & Co, 1872

Pg. 37 - 39

The settlers killed by the Indians, in the summer of 1780, were sadly and
reverently carried, by an armed band of their surviving companions, along the
cow-path which extended by the side of the fort [Lexington], on to what the
garrison called the "first hill," now known as the Baptist churchyard, on Main
street. A small space on this hill was cleared of cane, and here, after a silent
prayer, the earliest settlers of Lexington were buried.  This ground was
afterward set aside by the trustees of the town for religious purposes.  This
was the first cemetery used, and was for a long time the only one.  During the
fatal cholera season of 1833, when the citizens of Lexington were swept off by
the hundreds, tier upon tier of bodies were buried in this graveyard, and it
ceased to be used after that terrible time.  The next earliest graveyard
established was that of the McConnells, opposite the present Lexington cemetery,
and between Main street and the track of the Louisville, Lexington and
Cincinnati Railroad, and there many of the pioneers of the city and county rest
in obliterated graves.  The Maxwell burying-ground, on Bolivar street, was used
shortly after that of the McConnells.  In 1834, the city bought the ground
adjoining the Maxwell graveyard, and the two were merged in what is now called
the "Old City Graveyared."  Here the mother of John Maxwell was buried in 1804,
his wife in 1811, and the old pioneer himself in 1819.  In this neglected spot
the ancient tablets are broken and crumbling, and upon one of them can scarcely
be made out the inscription:

                      John Maxwell, sr.,
                     Died July 13th, 1819.
                        Aged 72 years.
Emigrated from Scotland to the United States in 1751, and to
                the wilds of Kentucky in 1774.

The Catholic cemetery, on Winchester street, was consecrated about forty years
ago.  Dr. Samuel Brown, Judge Hickey, Annie Spalding, the first superioress of
St. Catherine's Academy, are among the sleepers in this last resting place. The
Episcopal cemetery had its origin in 1837.  Many prominent persons are buried
there, and there are few Lexington families that have not a sad interest in its
sacred ground.  The same can be said of the Presbyterian burying ground
established shortly after the last mentioned.  The large trees which now throw
so grateful a shade over it, owe their presence to the mournful interest of Dr.
Daniel Drake, whose wife was buried there.  He raised the means to pay both for
the trees and their planting.  For history of Lexington cemetery, see year 1849.

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