This is not the exception, it's the rule. It's sad, but they're gone and we will all eventually be forgotten. Kudos to those that "rescue" and maintain these cemeteries.
You do realize that this is what has always happened to human remains, right? How else do you explain literally every archaeological find? People die and wind up forgotten. It's called reality.
@@MichelleJune67 the Great Pyramids of Giza and nearly every tomb in the Valley of the Kings was raided by grave robbers. Why would the graves of common folk be any different? Do the dead really need those trinkets any more than the living do? Is it better that a beggar starve, so that a corpse may molder in peace? I find it shameful that people revere the dead more than they care for the living.
Sad? It's reality. Humanity has existed for hundreds of thousands of years. It is literally impossible to look after every single person, in perpetuity. Communities die, cultures die, entire peoples die. Cemeteries are no exception to the passage of time. Archeologists make a living rediscovering these cultures and peoples. This isn't "sad", it's the natural process.
I love abandoned graveyards. They are beautiful and peaceful reminders of transience. We all get forgotten at some point. Only death makes life with living.
@@SkunkApe407Can you explain to me why murder is bad? I mean, animals kill each other in the wild all the time. And after all we’re just another animal right? So it shouldn’t be wrong for a person to kill another because after all, that’s just nature taking its course. Maybe the reason is actually because we’re not animals and we were created in the image of god. You will be judge for your awful treatment of people and the dead while you were on this earth if you believe in god or not. You’re headed for eternity in hell.
@@ShooterOnTheLedge we are 96% genetically identical to chimpanzees. If you think we're anything other than apes, you're an uneducated fool, and I want to sell you things.
Old graveyards are fascinating but sad in neglect. I wish people realized how much history is often in them. I've visited graves of some interesting and sometimes notable folks.
I’m curious if you tend the graves of your relatives that are 100-200 years old? Families die out and no one is left. It’s a fact. Yes, it’s sad. All that’s left in the cemetery is their bones. Our soul or energy has moved on to a better place.
Yeah, it's a good thing the government takes care of our graveyards where I'm from because I'm not going to "maintain" a grave that's over 100 years old of some person I have no connection with except bloodline. They're dead, gone, it's over etc. Most graves are exhumed after the 30 year lease is up anyway. Nothing left but some fragments of a femur etc.
@@donnaboisen6003Not the point, we NY state as well as the local government can set aside funds to keep and maintain these burial sites. We got money for illegal aliens we have money to respect our own final resting places.
I don't think there are relatives who knows anything about these graves anymore and even if there are, they're just few who don't care about that because it's been over 100 years
As a historian, I find this very sad. This is the only record that people have to find their long lost ancestors. These places need to be preserved for people who came after. Yes, now people opt for cremation, but please be sure to have your death recorded for people who come after you so they can look you up. It is crucial for people to be able to know where they come from, what their stories are and what their lives were like. I’m so thankful there are databases such as Ancestry. It gives a much needed reference for information. Great video as always!❤
I've only been into genealogy the last 10 years or so. My first thought was ancestry when I first saw this video. I think the best thing anybody could do right now is to document what headstones are left as best they can for findagrave as well as the other various genealogical databases.
I can't believe people are happily buying condos there and don't give a shit about that graves and history and people who are buried there and possible creepiness about the crypts.
@@SkunkApe407 Ha!! So true. 164 years is but a blink in time when you really think about it. The real tragedy is the final resting place of these people has been left to be reclaimed by nature, in a seemingly prosperous community, in such a short amount of time.
@@Ockenblock77 if you look at history, the number of cultures that have risen and fallen, in the matter of a generation or two, is absolutely mind boggling. Chances are, the prosperous community nearby to this cemetery probably has very little, if any cultural relation to those buried within. Most of those folks probably don't have any relatives buried there. Not much reason to think about dead people you never knew.
Let's level set. Always informative, interactive, and intriguing. Mobile Instinct is the master of his craft and we are all blessed to be able to enjoy his work. Thank you so much. Stay safe and be well.
Those open vaults might have been relocated. Also as coffins decompose over time, the plot will fall in somewhat. I used to work at a funeral home that a friend used to own till her passing. It is sad to see a cemetery in such bad condition considering what many families paid for the plots, vaults etc....as for me, I plan on just being a shake & bake...much cheaper.
Chris I've watched every one of your videos since you began. You never disappoint. Is why I renew my Patreon every year. Thanks for keeping us informed and entertained
My 1st Chris video was the Girl Scout Murders Camp yrs ago & took notice right away just how calm/soothing it was to listen to him been here ever since.
A lot of times in these old graveyard those mausoleum looking things are actually the old town morgue in the winter months before refrigeration. They would have to wait until the bodies thaws to prep them for burial.
For the illegible gravestones, try doing rubbings -- lay tissue paper over the markings & rub over the paper with charcoal or graphite (should be cheap at any decent art supply store). Rubbings will usually bring out the carvings fairly clearly.
Here in STATEN ISLAND NY same thing ! There have been people who have volunteered to rescue these abandoned cemeteries. You do fantastic work, I wish I could accompany you. Excellent erudite videos!
I just found your channel a couple of days ago and I like the way you present. It feels like I'm exploring with you and I like the ambience you include. Thanks for doing this!
Everything goes in cycles and circles. You are conceived and are made of materials your mother consumed. You are born into the world and consume and grow and become more of what is consumed. You live, you die, and your body returns to the ground from which it ultimately came. Plants, animals, bugs, and such come along and make use of your leftover materials. They live and die and are returned to nature. Eventually, your body becomes a part of nature again, where pieces of what was once you will find its way into other life. Birth comes from death, and death comes from birth. Whenever it's my time to go, I want my body to be donated to plants to feed them ad help them grow. I want to become part of the trees and plants and maybe someday end up supporting other life.
We grew up in a neighborhood of 25 houses built around an old Gimbel estate. There were two old cemeteries dating back to the 1800’s. One was right in a friends backyard. They didn’t seem to mind. It was set far enough back from their patio. At least no one could ever build behind them. 👻
I've never really understood why people have a difficult time with cemeteries it's not like the people are going to come up out of the ground and come after you if they could get out of the box they still have to dig up 6 ft of dirt and if they're able to do all that they're going to get you wherever you are.
@@seren4740 So true. In fact, on many old headstones from that era contain an epitaph “As you are now, so once was I. As I am now, so you must be …”. That always gave me chills! I'm sure this cemetery contains this epitaph several times, but time and acid rain has left the stones unreadable.
When I was in junior high school there was a cemetery that was right next to our school that we frequently would go over and have lunch in until I started working in the cafeteria. The oldest part of the cemetery was right up against our fence which was easy to walk around and then the fence that was separating the funeral home itself from the little Trail which is now a paved trail was probably only half as old as a cemetery which was easily a hundred years old at the time and that was 50 years ago
I love exploring old cemeteries. Once at an old farm in North Carolina there was a small cluster of old trees with maybe 15 or 20 graves of confederate soldiers. All had been dug up and according to the people at the farm, it was a soybean farm, the belt buckles, caps etc stolen. There were pieces of wooden coffins and bones all around. One gravestone read something like “Pvt Jones, 103rd Tennessee Volunteers killed at Antietam”. I was really tempted to take it but finally listened to my brain and thought really bad karma for the rest of your life. This was before cell phones so I didn’t get any photos.
I lived next to a cemetery for 2 years! They were the best,quiet neighbors. The dead can’t hurt you,it’s the living you have to be careful of!! Looks like it’s been completely vandalized. Very sad. There’s no more bodies in those graves. The wooden coffins and the bodies have disintegrated long ago,and gone back to the soil.
I was recently in Portugal. There is a cemetery in Lisbon that dates back to the earthquake in the early 1700s. The ground there is solid rock and its not practical to dig 6ft to bury someone. so, the thousands of graves are all above geound and the tombs are all in various states of care with a lot of them being destroyed with skeletons falling out of them. Bones everywhere. young and old. ...The only part i found disturbing were the very small bones falling out of very small caskets. .....amazing site and history there for sure.
Dude!! You're in my neck of the woods at this location! We used to have parties on the Hudson River in Beacon when I was in high-school. We lived in Hopewell Junction. I've come across a few really old family burial grounds from around the revolutionary War days while walkingthrough the woods near my house. Very cool parts of local history.
Sadly that's so true, probably got the land for pennies on the dollar, people don't care what is outside their door cause they are reclusive with electronics 😊
i saw in another video about cemeteries where if you take a flashlight, even in daylight, and shine it at a angle close to the grave stone the shadow from the light makes its easier to read writing on tombstones FYI.
All my family are in the same cemetery. This cemetery backs up to a fence where houses are and people live. I don't think I could have one in my backyard! I plan on being cremated to be with my husband.
It's very beautiful. Nice to see people are trying to hopefully keep it from completely growing over. It seems creepy but I think it could be a nice place to take a quiet walk
I am also , no funeral or any service, I have told my friends and family if you want to give me something give it to me while I am alive, so we can share the enjoyment 😊 ❤
This is the inscription on the one you couldn't read with the bust of George on it.( In Memoriam George W. ray D.D. Grand Master of the Grand Lodge of (?) of the State of New York and W.M. of Excelsior Lodge No. 195 who died at sea April 15th 1866 aged 40 Years)
I can never understand why cemeteries old or not so old, creep people out. All they are is fields of bones and ashes with stones to give them an identity. A journey's end for all its inhabitants. It's some of the living that creeps me out...
It's true, I always say it's not the dead that hurt you it's the living, but I do think cemeteries and Hallowed great should be treat with a lot more dignity and respect instead of people poking around and looking at them with cameras. 😟.
There was a time when cemeteries and graveyards were a place to visit and have picnics and hang out with the living. They were not seen so much as "sad" places, but humans have always had a thing against death because we don't want to think about meeting our end and being tossed into the ground to be forgotten.
I had a house that abutted a city cemetery. It was a newer one put in as residents expanded outward, in New Bedford, to be exact. Pine Grove Cemetery. Never felt creeped out by it, nor did my two boys. It was a place of peacefulness, full of birdsong and busy squirrels. I do like looking at old cemeteries. They're full of history.
It does seem so odd to have the houses right there. Granted, I love cemeteries, and wouldn't mind the view at all. I would probably try to upkeep some of the area in my spare time.
Does the City of Beacon or the community at large have nothing left over for their past citizens? What do the neighbours think, living in those townhouses? Looks more like human vandalism, than animals running away with bones… 😡 So sad. Respect the dead. RIP (Time for a good clean up.)
Ever hear of the Poltergeist curse as in what happened to many of the people involved with that movie? I would be scared shitless to mess around with someones remains I bet many who have vandalized or stolen bones have had less than pleasant lives almost like good luck just keeps fleeing from them.
It is amazing how often cemeteries are moved. I was at a meeting about the train tracks in my city and the plans to make it a quiet zone. I saw a photo of the crossing from the 1900s and there was a cemetery where now a 3 family house sits. I kept looking at the photo and I was like, where is that cemetery ??!!! They said they moved it in the early 1900s and built a couple houses where the cemetery was. Except no one had any information on where the remains went. I really think they just took the stones and left the bodies and built on top of it. I really do The church was actually right across the street and still is there today and has been the town library since the fifties maybe further back than that So that church and the other church on the other side of the street and the cemetery for both of those that took up a city block were sold to the city and I spent a good amount of time trying to find where they moved the graves and I talked with the Catholic church and they had no records of that cemetery and no records of anybody that was buried there despite it being the primary cemetery for the city from when it started There was another cemetery in the city across the river and I know for a fact that they built a house right on top of where the cemetery used to be and when they were digging in the basement they hit the gravestones and the bodies It just is mindblowing that the people are forgotten and no one cares about the remains just the property because it becomes valuable In the New York metro area the cemeteries are completely full and it is a big business paying families to have their relatives remains dug up and cremated in order to get that burial plot to sell for a new burial.
It's heartbreaking really because all people want to do is build houses and play grounds I think some of these people don't think of the history and what they are doing, they don't really care, it's all about money. And it's heartless. 😟.
When you walk thru an old cemetery, speak the names of the dead aloud. They are then "Remembered". Most names have not been spoken aloud for years, decades, even centuries.
Thats a very interesting fact about William Few. I live just outside of Augusta Georgia, where his body is now buried. There are roads and other things with his name on them around here.
Thanks for posting this and bringing awareness to this problem. I have ancestors buried in a very small cemetery called Castle Cemetery (Newburgh, Indiana). Castle Cemetery is neglected too. I live far away from southern Indiana which is the location of Castle Cemetery and I don’t know what can be done to respect the cemetery and the Castles who were residents of Indiana in the early 1800s.
There’s something beautiful about a cemetery being reclaimed by nature. We like to think we bury our loved ones and they’ll be there forever, but nothing lasts forever. Our bodies are to return to dust as surely as we came from it, and even our stone and steel eventually crumbles. It’s a perfect allegory for the futility of all our vast ambitions.
We used to walk past a stand of trees on the way to our shooting spot. Pretty thick undergrowth. Never checked it out. Once, by coincidence, I flew over this spot at about 6,000 ft. Noticed that tree stand was perfectly circular. Went back and found a family cemetery with the circular stacked limestone wall gone, except for some of the foundation. Only two tombstones were upright. We uprighted the others that we saw and secured them. Only a few were decipherable. This family occupied the area from late 18th to very early 20th century as far as we could tell. We reported it to the the University. The lady said thanks and hung up.
Absolutely my friends and family know what I want, cremation and no services. I said to them if you want to give me something give it to me now while I am alive and then we can all enjoy it ❤
It’s criminal that the local town let it get this bad. I grew up next to a cemetery like this in Maine with tombstones going back to the late 1700s. That cemetery is kept in order by the city.
The people in those condos ought to adopt that cemetery and get together to clean it up, reset headstones and remove all of the debris. It would be a nice community project for them.
We have a super old cemetery where I live. It has been vandalized for so many years that most of the head stones have been lost. It is one of if not the oldest cemetery in that county. There are no records to use to try and restore it.
I’m sorry. I had to comment. I’m a serial urban explorer. I love decay, ruins, history. I also love to use the word I. But I must admit, this channel is awesome!
Most interesting. Grim as it is, the remains of these graves such as they are, constitute a more concrete memorial of their occupants than the millions lost at sea or dumped into mass burial trenches during war and epidemic, with no record of who they were.
What has always bothered me is how any cemetery can end up abandoned or even moved. Once you lay someone to rest, that is where they should remain for eternity and no business or corporation or government should be able to just dig them all up and move them somewhere else. I bet there are countless graves out there that have been lost to time. It wouldn't surprise me if some shady actors in the past conveniently removed headstones from a cheap property then developed it. Being someone who loves plants and history, I want to get into exploring these old cemeteries to see what kind of plants exist, but my physical conditions make that pretty much impossible right now, and I know I would end up so sad at the condition of such places. An old family cemetery of some relatives I'm descended from is on my "to visit" list but I fear someone will come along and destroy or develop the land it's on before I can get to it. It's currently in a rural area surrounded by farm fields, but there is a new common trend where developers are buying up farm land to develop into suburbs. If I could, I would enjoy going to some of these kinds of abandoned cemeteries and at least cleaning the headstones and repairing them as needed and maybe making a proper path and cleaning around any border wall or fence. Everyone buried there was one alive and well with family and loved ones. Hopes and dreams and aspirations.
Creamation is my family’s go to. My husband’s ashes are in a beautiful clock and when I pass I will be put in with him. This way it can be passed down to future generations. Or if the kids want to they can spread our ashes somewhere. I never have wanted to be buried and forgotten.
This is just one example of an abandoned cemetery. But I bet there's probably hundreds or thousands that have been built over with time. Probably very common place to make room for new construction.
I’d personally take the cracked concrete plaques home, stick them together and engulf them in resin, with a bolt anchor running into the resin so it can be attached to the remains of the structure. The bolt would not touch the plaque itself incase of forces.
3:58 George W. Ray d. 16 April 1866, age 40 Apparently he was a Grand Master of the Free and Accepted Masons (based on what little I could read, and the Masonic symbol on the upper portion of the headstone).
no wonder people want to be creameted, nothing sader than a negleted and forgotten cemetery sad comment on todays society and how the dead are respected good job Chris
That pile of sticks was done by Sasquatch. They either pile sticks up or they pile stones. I've seen it before and cemeteries and I've seen it along the highways the next to a crucifix where somebody died in the car accident.
Heartbreaking to think that the bereaved once stood right there , often in tears, to see their loved ones buried. I have always felt that it was perfectly ok to have nature claim a cemetery. I saw many in 16 years of surveying. Some are beautiful, even overgrown. However, seeing crypts torn open and stones stolen outrages me. Some people are ghouls.
We had a long neglected cemetary in Southern Illinois. It was fascinating. I was a kid then, maybe 45 years ago, and would just explore this stuff. Thinking of the cycle of life and death, while I was where deceased bodies were. The tombstones, if you could read them (erosion and age) told their own stories. It was creepy, silent, and captivating, all at the same time. Ghosts and spirits coming out at night? That kind of thing. Hey, I was only like 12 then. Interesting was some of the graves were the "six foot under" thing. The others were these stone or concrete above-ground box things, which contained the coffin. One site like that had the lid partially removed, like from a grave robber or vandal. I did peek inside. Nothing, just full of grass and weeds. Was there a body there?? Whoa...
The Betsy Ross bridge in Philadelphia over the Delaware river, they moved the bodies and uses the grave stones as rip rap along side the river. That seems like a desecration to me.
