Worcester Mission Cemetery - Park Hill, OK - Oklahoma Historical Markers on Waymarking.com

A historical marker in this cemetery was placed by the Oklahoma Historical Society, which has maintained the deed on this property since 1952. There are four listings shown on the marker: The Worcester Cemetery; the Park Hill Mission and Press; Rev. Samuel A. Worcester, and Elias Boudinot.

Wording for two of these documentations is shown below. Wording for the other two can be found in the photo gallery. This is a fascinating place to visit - filled with the history of the missionaries who served the Cherokee in the 1800's. Well worth a visit.

WORCESTER CEMETERY

Located near the site of the Park Hill Mission, Worcester Cemetery contains the remains of missionaries and their families who contributed to the education of the Cherokee. Reverend Samuel Austin Worcester, who established the mission in 1836, chose this spot as a cemetery because the soil was too rocky ever to be farmed. It was so rocky that when Worcester's daughter Ann Eliza died in 1905, her grave had to be blasted out with dynamite.

One of the first people to be buried here was Elias Boudinot. He was assassinated nearby in 1839 for signing the Treaty of New Echota, which most of the Cherokees opposed since it led to removal from their homeland east of the Mississippi River. He was buried under a slab with no inscription. The Oklahoma Historical Society erected a monument for him here in 1964.

Samuel Worcester supervised the Park Hill Mission and Press. He was buried in this cemetery along with his first wife, Ann Orr, and his second wife, Erminia Nash. Two of his daughters lie here with members of their families. Ann Eliza and her husband, Reverend William S. Robertson, were missionaries to the Creeks at Tullahassee Mission. Sarah married Doctor Daniel Dwight Hitchcock, whose mother Nancy was also buried in the cemetery. She and her husband Jacob Hitchcock were missionary workers at Dwight Mission. Years later, Worcester relatives put a fence around the family plot.

There are other mission workers in Worcester Cemetery. Hamilton Balentine was a missionary among the Creeks, Choctaws and Cherokees as well as superintendent of the Cherokee Female Seminary in 1875 and 1876. Miss Nancy Thompson taught at Park Hill Mission and helped in the Worcester household. Caleb Covel, a friend of the Worcester family, taught at Dwight Mission.

Outside the area where the missionaries are buried, the cemetery is full of graves that are unmarked, or marked only by rough stones. About 1870 a cholera epidemic broke out in the mission community. Many children who died in the epidemic are buried in these graves.
In time, Worcester Cemetery began to suffer from neglect. When Ann Eliza Robertson died in 1905, a bonfire that had been made from dead trees cleared from the graves illuminated her funeral. Livestock wandered through the cemetery and broke headstones. Plowing disturbed some forgotten graves. Finally, interest in the cemetery revived. Around 1950, a group of history students and teachers from Northeastern State College cleared the fenced plot, and in 1952 the cemetery was deeded to the Oklahoma Historical Society and restored. In July, 1995 a storm caused extensive damage to many of the trees and fences, so restoration continues. Worcester Cemetery is no longer active. (Source: Anna Eddings, Murrell Home, Oklahoma Historical Society)

PARK HILL MISSION AND PRESS

Samuel Newton and his wife, Mary, were among the earliest missionaries to the Cherokee in this area. They worked at a mission station named Forks of the Illinois which had been established in 1830 on the east side of the Illinois River close to the mouth of the Barren Fork. The spot was so unhealthy that Mary and their small daughter died. In 1837 the mission was moved three miles west to Campbell Springs. Newton named the area Park Hill because it reminded him of the estates of noblemen in England.

Park Hill soon became the site of a thriving mission. Reverend Samuel Austin Worcester, who had been a missionary and printer among the Cherokee in the East, came west to continue his work. He set up the printing press at Union Mission, but its buildings were dilapidated and the location inconvenient to the Cherokee. Worcester chose Park Hill as the permanent site for his mission, and construction began in the summer of 1836. He and his family moved there soon afterwards. In June of 1837 he set up the printing press a mile further to the west of Newton's school in a meadow overlooking the Park Hill valley. That same summer he established a church with nineteen members. Major George Lowrey soon became deacon and retained that post until his death in 1852. By 1838 the mission school had been moved up to the meadow with Samuel Newton as the teacher. Other teachers there in the 1830s were Esther Smith from Harrisburg, New York, and Sarah Ann Palmer.

At the mission printing office, Worcester continued the work he had begun in the East, printing literature to educate and Christianize the Cherokee. Elias Boudinot, former editor of the Cherokee Advocate, helped with translating and printing until his death in 1839. Stephen Foreman replaced him as translator. With their help, Worcester translated and printed most of the Bible in Cherokee. John F. Wheeler was the first printer, later replaced by John Candy. The press turned out textbooks, the Cherokee Almanac, religious tracts, and volumes of Cherokee hymnals.

A brick church building was completed at the mission by 1854. Cherokee Chief John Ross and merchant and planter, George M. Murrell, donated much of the money to buy the church bell.

The Park Hill Mission and Press came to an end with the Civil War. Reverend Charles Torrey came to help run the mission when Worcester became an invalid after a serious accident. Torrey became supervisor after Worcester's death in 1859. Shortly before the War began, the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions decided to close the mission because of the troubles the impending war was bringing to the region. They also believed the Cherokees were no longer a heathen people and did not require the help of missionaries. (Source: Anna Eddings, Murrell Home, Oklahoma Historical Society

County: Cherokee Record Address:: South Park Hill Road East of Highway 82 Park Hill, OK US 74451 Rate the Site: Sponsor (Who put it there): Oklahoma Historical Society Web site if available: Not listed Date Erected: Not listed

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