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 Hillsborough Pioneer Cemetery - Hillsborough, NB Posted by:  T0SHEA
N 45° 55.564 W 064° 38.850
20T E 372261 N 5087152
Established in the early 1700's, Hillsborough Pioneer Cemetery was used by a succession of settlers, French, German and British, until the early part of the 20th century.
Waymark Code: WMT8GV
Location: New Brunswick, Canada
Date Posted: 10/14/2016
Views: 4
If I'm following a somewhat convoluted history of this church correctly, this is the fourth church, three of them Baptist, which have stood on this site. Its history goes back to about 1795, when Henry Steeves began to preach to the locals. The First Hillsborough Baptist Church was organized in 1822, possibly in a nearby barn on the 6th of October of that year. There was already a church on the site, a nondenominational church built in 1778, which was removed sometime after that, to become a Methodist church, and the first Baptist church built on the spot. In time this building was removed and a second, larger church erected on the spot.
Immediately south of the church is the Hillsborough Pioneer Cemetery, now a municipal heritage site. It was established, according to Historic Places Canada, in about 1700, which would make it the first cemetery in Hillsborough. The first families to arrive in the area, all Acadian families, chose this hilltop site for their burial ground. After the Acadian Expulsion, known as the Grande Dérangement, the cemetery was taken over, first by British and German settlers, then by British Empire Loyalists.
The cemetery was used until the early twentieth century. Hillsborough Pioneer Cemetery
DESCRIPTION OF HISTORIC PLACE
The Hillsborough Pioneer Cemetery is an early cemetery that was used from the beginning of the 1700s until the early 20th century. It is located on Main Street in Hillsborough to the south of the Hillsborough Baptist Church and is enclosed by a wrought iron fence.
HERITAGE VALUE
The Hillsborough Pioneer Cemetery is designated a Local Historic Place because it symbolizes, on one small plot of land, the diverse cultural influences reaching from the distant past which continue to shape today's society. This is reflected in the family names of those interred here. In 1700, the Blanchard Family from Port Royal, in what is now Nova Scotia, became the first Europeans to settle this area via Port Royal in what is now Nova Scotia. They and the Saulnier, Aucoin, and Thibodeau families who joined them selected this hilltop as their burying ground. For fifty-five years these and other Acadian families worked to dyke the raging river, tilled the land and laid their loved ones to rest. The second wave of settlement after 1765 continued to use this burial site and eventually added a common meeting house immediately to the north. This meeting house, built in 1778, was non-denominational. However, in 1822 the first Hillsborough Baptist Church was organized and this denomination has occupied the old site since, with a succession of four churches.
The Acadian Families were from Normandy, France. The Gross family, also originally from France, were Huguenots. The Steeves, Lutz, Trites and Horsmans were proud Germans. The Duffys and Gallaghers came from Ireland. The Wallace, Lewis and Irving families found their way to Hillsborough from Scotland. The Taylors and Blights were English, while the Jonahs and Pecks hailed from Switzerland. And then the tide of United Empire Loyalists arrived from the United States. Their individual journeys may have ended on this hill top, but their collective spirit continues to expand through the intricately interwoven families they have left as their legacies.
CHARACTER-DEFINING ELEMENTS
- location on the brow of a hill in the geographical center of the Village of Hillsborough;
- proximity to the original site of the former common meeting house;
- ornate wrought iron fence along the western and southern boundaries;
- a war memorial and cenotaph;
- the diversity of cultural backgrounds reflected in the family names of those interred here;
- the graves of the heads of the Steeves Family settlers, Henrick and Rachel;
- the graves of three of the seven Steeves sons who arrived in 1766;
- the Duffy Family plot;
- the Gross Family plot;
- the Wallace Family plot;
- the Lewis Family plot;
- the markers of local sandstone, marble, wrought iron and granite;
- archaeological resources related to the use of the site by early Acadians.
From Historic Places Canada
URL of Page from Heritage Register: [Web Link]
Address of site:
2807a Main Street
Hillsborough, New Brunswick
E4H 2X5
Site's Own URL: Not listed
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