Old Burying Ground (1763), Wolfville

By J.A. Colwell & S.A. Ferguson

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LOCATION - On the north side of Main Street opposite the junction with Highland Avenue.

DESCRIPTION - Two churches 1763 and 1820 once occupied part of this site.  The virtual founder of the town of Wolfville was Nathan DeWolf - (1729-89) -stone 138- , a M. A . from Yale, lawyer and man of property in his native Connecticut.  His Planter allotment was on the north side of Main Street opposite the present Baptist church.

Rev. Edmund Albert Crawley (1799-1888) - stone 242 - was founder-in-chief of Acadia University, third president, one of the first two professors and designer of the first college building. The Founders' tablet in University Hall lists the names of those, along with Crawley, who purchased the bulk of the present campus in 1829 and obtained a charter from the legislature in 1838-1840.

Isaac Chipman (1817 -52) - stone 216- near the northeast corner of the cemetery - was born near Berwick, N. S., attended Horton Academy and taught at Horton and Acadia College.  As professor of Natural History he led a field trip by boat around Minas Basin. Off Blomidon the boat capsized, and Professor Chipman,  Rev. E. D. Very, four students and one boatman were drowned. Mr. Benjamin, one of the boatman, survived. One of the students, William Edward Grant, (1826-1853) - stone 217-  is buried beside Professor Chipman. Folklore tells us that a church paper recorded the event as "six precious souls perished and a man from Gaspereau."

During 1987 and 1988 the Wolfville Heritage Advisory Committee cooperated with the Town Park and Tree Commission to have the stones cleaned, repaired and re-erected where they had fallen. Cemetery records were compiled and a map made of the areas where individual stones are to be found.

Reference: Davison, James Doyle, 1990. What Mean these Stones? published by the Wolfville Heritage Advisory Committee with the assistance of the Nova Scotia Department of Tourism and Culture, the Town of Wolfville and friends of the restoration and publication project.

Available from Wolfville Heritage Advisory Committee, P. 0. Box 418, Wolfville, N. S. BOP 1XO.

Prepared for the Geological Association of Canada and Mineralogical Association of Canada Joint Annual Meeting in Wolfville, Nova Scotia, May 25-27, 1992. Meeting Hosted by the Atlantic Geoscience Society.