Jeremiah Ward - Williamsburg, MA
Posted by: 
neoc1
N 42° 23.749 W 072° 44.152
18T E 686348 N 4696208
The grave of Jeremiah Ward, who drowned in flood resulting from the Mill River Dam Disaster, is located in Village Hill Cemetery on Village Hill Road in Williamsburg, MA.
Waymark Code: WMWBW2
Location: Massachusetts, United States
Date Posted: 08/10/2017
Views: 0
Jeremiah Ward was a stone-mason. He and his wife Sarah escaped their house but he died while returning to his house to try to to save his sister-in-law Electa Knights. He is buried in a family plot along with his wife and sister-in-law.
The grave of Jeremiah Ward is to the left of his wife and sister-in-law. The gray gravestone is inscribed:
JEREMIAH WARD
Drowned by the
Breaking of the Reservoir
May 16, 1874
AE 71.
In 1865 The Hampshire Reservoir Company build a dam three miles north of Williamsburg, MA on the east branch of the Mill River. The dam was built for corporate mill owners for the sum of $35,000. It was 42 feet above the bed of the stream, holding back 90 acres of water with an average depth of 24 feet.
On May 16, 1874, the dam collapsed. It was determined at an inquest that poor supervision and faulty workmanship of the contractor, caused the dam to give way. Water swept down through Williamsburg and the villages of Haydenville, Leeds, and Skinnerville. The disaster cost included: 144 lives lost, 750 people were made homeless, and damage to buildings, personal property, bridges, dams, roads, factories, and mills amounted to over one million dollars. One third Williamsburg was devastated in the largest disaster in New England of its time.
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