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- 130 REMINISCENCES OF OLD VICTORIA
were many naval men buried there, and the dates on some of the headboards and stones in Quadra Street Cemetery show an earlier date than the opening of it, there being two burials from war vessels, one in 1846, H. M. S. Cormorant, and one in 1852. These early dates show that Her Majesty's vessels were in Esquimalt at that time. Naval men and Hudson's Bay Company's employees were the large majority of those buried in the first cemetery. As a boy, I had a great weakness for funerals, and living only a block from Quadra Street, I attended scores in my day. I naturally liked the naval funerals best, for there were soldiers and sailors, and bands of music, with three volleys over the grave, so I missed few. The funerals came from Esquimalt, generally by water, in large boats propelled by oars, and landed at the Hudson's Bay Company's wharf.
By the inscriptions, a large majority were young men and sailors, and many were the result of accidents in Esquimalt harbor by drowning.
I well remember the funeral of Captain Bull, of H. M. surveying ship Plumper, who died at the age of twenty-seven years, the coffin being fastened to a gun carriage and pulled by bluejackets. The state of Victoria's streets at that time was such that it required a deal of power to propel any vehicle, and especially was this the case with Quadra Street. I have often seen a funeral come to a dead standstill and the hearse dug out of the mud, as also teams loaded with stones for monuments in the cemetery.
We will suppose the hearse has been dug out, and in the cemetery near the grave, in many cases men might be seen bailing out the grave, one below and one on top; especially was this the case with the Roman Catholic ground. And I have known when it was necessary to hold
OLD QUADRA STREET CEMETERY 131
the coffin down in the water with shovels or have a man get down and stand on the coffin until enough soil was thrown on it to keep it down. What must the friends have thought at this time, as the dirty water was forcing its way into the coffin? In the majority of burials there was no grave-case, which helped to make matters worse.
I have always paid periodical visits to this cemetery, the chief reason being that my mother was buried there when I was fifteen years old. She expressed a wish to be carried to her grave instead of being taken in a hearse, and it was the first instance I can remember in Victoria, although it may have been done earlier.
Both Bishops Cridge and Garrett, the clergymen who conducted the burial services over her, are alive to-day.
Some four years ago, I had a marble headstone put on her grave, which was enclosed with a fence, and last fall I saw it there although buried in weeds. A few weeks ago a lady friend asked me if my mother's name was Jane; for that she had, in walking through the cemetery, come across a stone which must have been hers. I went up to investigate, and after some hours' search found the stone, but the enclosure was gone, and I had a time locating the grave, to replace the stone. In compiling the information given in this article, I made many visits lately, and I can say that it is a disgrace to a civilized community to have the last resting-place of Victoria's pioneers in such a condition?marble and sandstone monuments lying in all directions, broken either by falling over naturally, or with rocks by some vandal.
It is a mistake to suppose that there are few remaining relations of these long-buried dead. At least there are fifty per cent. of them represented by relations to-day, as I shall show later on, and I hope the state of
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