Consecration

On the Sunday afternoon of June 23, 1844, more than 2000 people from Danvers, MA and surrounding areas gathered to witness the consecration ceremony for the new Walnut Grove Cemetery. Rev. John Brazer D.D. of Salem, MA an 1813 high honors graduate of Harvard College, presided over the ceremony. Below is an excerpt from his address:

“We stand in that great temple of nature, not made with hands, whose roof is the all-embracing sky, whose floor is the broad earth, whose pillars are these majestic murmur of running waters, and the air made vocal by the surrounding grove…These rural cemeteries, indeed, comprise all the essential advantages that are to be especially cared for. They afford in the first place the best security for these remains which can be found in this world of continual change. They are arranged in spots which are secluded from the ordinary haunts of men, away from the busy scenes of active life.”

The ceremony also included prayers by Revs. S. C. Bulkely and J. W. Eaton of Danvers, and hymns by Drs. Nichols, Barstow and Flint.

As Rev. John Brazer said on that day back in June of 1844, “…I know not how we could better pay a well deserved tribute to the judgment and taste of our friends as exhibited in their arrangement of this place, than to say — look around!” Many years later, we too encourage you to look around and select the final resting place for you and your loved ones.

Flint, James, D.D. (1851), p. 173, Verses on Many Occasions: With Others for which it May be Thought There was No Occasion, Lynn, MA: Press of Horace J. Butterfield.