The first cemetery of Bergen was on the south side of Vroom street,
just outside of the southeast corner of the palisade of the new town,
where it is said there was a little fort for protection against the
Indians. In this burial ground the first church was built, on the site
now occupied by Dominie Cornelison's family vault, and fronting on
Vroom street, facing Tuers avenue. After the cemetery had been used
over seventy years, in 1738 the second burying ground was opened on
the southwest corner of Vroom street and Bergen avenue. These older
cemeteries were not laid out in family lots, but the graves were made
in any place convenient, and thus the last resting places of the
different members of a family were seldom near together.
For nearly two centuries these two burial grounds were the only ones
in this vicinity. In the fall of 1829 an episode occurred which led
to the opening of the Jersey City Cemetery. One morning a passer-by
saw the body of a drowned man washed ashore at Harsimus; he drew it up
on the grass, and after a little several others gathered there and in
the discussion that followed it was decided to give the body suitable
burial and mark the grave with a stone that it might be identified
in case any friends of the dead man might eventually be found. The
little group contributed a sum sufficient, as they supposed, to make
the desired provision, and a committee was appointed to attend to the
matter, and see that the body was properly buried in the cemetery
of the Bergen Church. The sexton charged $12 to open a grave, which
seemed to the people of Jersey City such an enormous price that it
aroused universal indignation, which resulted in a public meeting at
Hugh McCutcheon's Farmer's Hotel at 42 York street (quite a celebrated
tavern of the day), at which it was decided to open a new cemetery and
no longer be dependent upon that of the Bergen Church. Subscriptions
were taken and a cemetery company was formed of which David C.
Colden, one of the associates, and at that time Mayor of New York,
was President, Robert Gilchrist was Treasurer, and J. D. Miller was
Secretary. The result was the purchase of five and a half acres on the
hill-side south of the Newark Turnpike, and the Jersey City Cemetery
was opened, at that time a quiet, country place, where under the
drooping willows, many families, prominent in the early life of Jersey
City were laid to rest far from the noise of the young city; but with
the passing years, the city has extended out to and far beyond their
resting place, all about them are city streets and a railroad now runs
along at the foot of the hill.
[Illustration: THE OLD M'CUTCHEON HOTEL.]
In 1831 or thereabouts, the third burial ground of the Bergen Church,
east of Bergen avenue and south of Vroom street, was bought of Aaron
Tuers for $500, and surveyed and laid out in fourteen foot lots by
Colonel Sip. These lots were sold at $5 each, the gore lots being
reserved for the poor. In 1849 the New York Bay Cemetery was opened; it
is one of the largest Protestant cemeteries in the county, embracing
about one hundred acres, sloping to the waters of the bay, a very
beautiful location on Ocean and Garfield avenues. About 1857 Abraham
Spier, while acting as sexton for the Bergen Church, laid out a burying
ground south of and adjoining the west end of the second church
cemetery, which is still known as Spier's Cemetery. Since then the
Catholics have opened a cemetery south of Communipaw avenue, and west
of West Side avenue. Jersey City has other cemeteries outside of the
city limits, of more recent organization.
[Illustration: PAULUS HOOK FROM HARSIMUS IN 1823.]