Central Burying Ground, Boston

The Central Burying Ground is a cemetery in Boston, Massachusetts, United States. It was established on Boston Common in 1756. It is located on Boylston Street between Tremont Street and Charles Street.

Central Burying Ground
Central Burying Ground, Boston Common, 2008
Details
Established	1756 (1756)
Location	Boylston Street, Boston Common, Boston, Massachusetts, U.S.

Famous burials there include the artist Gilbert Stuart, painter of the famed portraits of George Washington and Martha Washington, and the composer William Billings, who wrote the famous colonial hymn "Chester." Also buried there are Samuel Sprague and his son, Charles Sprague, one of America's earliest poets. Samuel Sprague was a participant in the Boston Tea Party and fought in the American Revolutionary War.^{[citation needed]}

When the Tremont Street subway was under construction in the 1890s, burials were discovered in the area abutting the cemetery. These were reinterred in a mass grave within the bounds of the burying ground.^{[citation needed]}

Notable burials

• "British soldiers who died of disease during the occupation of the city [1775–1776], and those who died of wounds received at Bunker Hill"^[1]
• William Billings (1746–1800), composer^[2]
• Caleb Davis (1738–1797)^[3]
• Stephen Higginson (1743–1828), American politician and merchant^[4]
• John Baptiste Julien (d.1805), proprietor of Julien's Restorator^[1]
• Gilbert Stuart (1755–1828)^[5]
• Charles Sprague (1791–1875)

See also

• Funerary art in Puritan New England
• List of cemeteries in Boston, Massachusetts

Image gallery

• 
  Marker of Chow Manderien, died 1798 (photo from 2008)
• 
  Marker of William Raymond (2004 photo)
• 
  Detail of 1814 map of Boston, showing Central Burying Ground
• 
  "Here were interred the remains of persons found under the Boylston St. Mall during the digging of the subway, 1895" (photo from 2008)
• 
  View of Boylston St., 2008
• 
  2008
• 
  2008
• 
  2005
• 
  Central Burying Ground

References

1. King's hand-book of Boston. 1889; p.240
2. City of Boston. "Central Burying Central". Retrieved May 9, 2010.
3. Ogden Codman, comp. Gravestone inscriptions and records of tomb burials in the Central burying ground, Boston Common: and inscriptions in the South burying ground, Boston. The Essex Institute, 1917
4. "Higginson, Stephen". Biographical Directory of the United States Congress. Retrieved July 16, 2024.
5. Bacon. Book of Boston: fifty years' recollections of the New England metropolis. 1916.

Further reading

• Nathaniel Bradstreet Shurtleff. "Central Burying-Ground." A topographical and historical description of Boston, Part 1, 2nd ed. Boston: Printed by request of the City Council, 1871.

External links

Media related to Central Burying Ground (Boston, Massachusetts) at Wikimedia Commons

• Official website – City of Boston
• Central Burying Ground, Boston at Find a Grave
• Google news archive. Articles about the Central Burying Ground

42.35276°N 71.06597°W / 42.35276; -71.06597