Let’s talk of graves, of worms, and epitaphs; Make dust our paper and with rainy eyes, write sorrow on the bosom of the Earth. Let’s choose Executors and talk of wills; And yet not so -for what can we bequeath, save our deposed bodies to the ground?
-William Shakespeare (Richard II)
West Lane Cemetery in Kensington isn’t actually on West Lane, it’s on High Road. It’s situated on the side of a hill and has only a narrow paved path to get to the top. The path isn’t really wide enough for a hearse. In March, 1990 my grandmother was buried there, and me, my brother and cousins, who were pallbearers, had to carry her casket up the relatively steep hill, almost to the top. This was twenty years before I started doing genealogy, and I had no idea at the time how important this cemetery is to my family history or how many relatives we were walking over as we made our way up the hill to my grandmother’s final resting place next to my maternal grandfather.
The Moore’s that my mother knew were in Southington on Andrews Street. These were her father’s maternal uncles, aunts and cousins and they visited them often when my mother was growing up. So in 2010, I was perplexed as to why my grandparents were buried in Kensington. They’re buried in a plot with my grandfather’s parents (my great grandparents), Charles and Sara (Moore) Kellogg. On a visit to West Lane with my mother that year I asked her why they were buried in Kensington and not Southington. Mom, who has a habit of answering questions she doesn’t know the answers to with simple responses, looked down the hill and scanned the landscape and replied, “I think they really liked the view”. It made sense, it really is beautiful there.
However, there was more to the story. Sara Moore was the daughter of Charles and Sarah (Horton) Moore who are also buried in West Lane. Charles Moore owned a farm and at least two houses on Andrews Street in Southington and died there in 1913. So it still didn’t make any sense why he was buried in Kensington. More research revealed that Charles was the son of Sheldon and Susan (Dickinson) Moore and he was born in Kensington in 1834 and lived there until he married in 1857. Mystery solved.
But going back another generation to Sheldon’s parents, Roswell and Lovina (Phillips) Moore, I found Roswell lived on Andrews Street in Southington, a mile north of what was later Charlie Moore’s home and farm.
Roswell and Lovina Moore are buried in Oak Hill Cemetery in Southington along with Roswell’s parents, Roswell and Desire (Dunham) Moore. Also buried there are Roswell and Lovina’s sons, Eli, Nelson, Charles and Lurian, and their daughters, Mrs. Dimmis Grannis and Mrs. Sarah Frisbie. Nelson and Lurian being the only two of Roswell’s twelve children not to survive to adulthood.
Roswell Moore owned R. Moore and Sons or Moore’s Mills in Kensington. Sons, John, Roswell, Jr., and Oliver were sent there to work the mills. John later removed to West Springfield, Massachusetts and is buried in Agawam Center Cemetery in Agawam. Roswell, Jr., Oliver, and later Sheldon all made Kensington their home and all three died there and are buried in West Lane Cemetery.
The first Moore buried in West Lane was Caroline (Leonard) Moore, the first wife of Oliver, who died in 1829. According to findagrave.com there are 48 Moore’s buried in West Lane, all of them related. The one exception being Pauline (Moore) Canfield who was the daughter of Walter and Adeline (Castle) Moore. Walter Moore was in no way related to these Moore’s, but when Adeline divorced him and married Roswell Allen Moore, Jr. (great grandson of Roswell Moore) sometime after 1900, Pauline Moore became Roswell Allen Moore’s stepdaughter, thus connecting her to these Moore’s. There are still others in West Lane who are also related to this line of Moore’s but don’t go by the name Moore, including my grandfather.
Sheldon Moore is buried next to his wife adjacent to the paved path near the top of the hill. His headstone fell over before 2010 and the soft earth at West Lane is slowly claiming it. I’ve visited the cemetery at least once a year for the past six years. When I do, I make sure to brush the leaves, dirt and grass off his stone, revealing his name and epitaph so that his final resting place will not be lost just yet.
There’s a boulder in West Lane that, according to Ethelbert Allen Moore, was once in the middle of Sheldon Moore’s apple orchard. Carved into the top of it is the name, Moore. I once wondered why West Lane wasn’t called High Road Cemetery. I’m beginning to wonder why it’s not called Moore Cemetery.
Sources:
- findagrave.com
- ancestry.com
- Hale Collection of Cemetery Inscriptions and Newspaper Notices, 1629-1934
- Tenth Generation by Ethelbert Allen Moore (1950)
I’m a descendant of the following people buried at West Lane Cemetery:
- Sheldon Moore
- Susan (Dickinson) Moore
- Charles Moore
- Sarah (Horton) Moore
- Charles S. Kellogg
- Sara (Moore) Kellogg
- Charles S. Kellogg, Jr.
- Frances (Trottier) Kellogg
- Moses Dickinson
- Susannah (Langdon) Dickinson
- Jesse Dickinson
- Chloe (Allen) Dickinson
- John Allyn
- Ruth (Burnham) Allyn
Sheldon Moore 