You
will note that for some reason this gives no details for grave number nine, but
elsewhere in the document we find this was for interment number 4778, name: Thomas
B Russell; date 8/11/55.
As
will be seen from the dates and in the following article the numbering is not
the order of burials. The graves were started from the right hand side of the
plot and then worked across to the left side in two rows. The actual order of
interments was:
4.
Sarah A Russell 1846
3.
James G Russell 1847
9.
Thomas B Russell 1855
8.
Lucinda H Russell 1858
7.
Joseph L Russell Jr. 1860
6.
Ann E Russell 1861
2.
Charles T Russell 1875
1.
Mary Russell 1886
5.
Joseph L Russell 1897
But
first, some background to the Allegheny cemetery.
As
cities in America grew in the 19th century, the problem of burying
the dead became an issue, involving both public health and space. Town and city
graveyards tended to be small, sectarian, and full. The rural cemetery or
garden cemetery was a solution. It was designed to be a landscaped region that
allowed the public to have parkland outside the city area, while also allowing
the families of the rich to indulge in eye-catching memorial architecture. The latter
seemed to work on the principle that, while you may not be able to take it with
you, at least you could show the huddled masses you’d once had it! It also took
the burial of the dead outside of church control.
The
first rural cemetery in America was founded near Boston in 1831. Quickly others
followed, including the one where most of CTR’s immediate family are buried, in
Allegheny. The Allegheny model was chartered in 1844, and the grounds
(originally one hundred acres of farmland) were dedicated to their new use on
September 20, 1845. Other tracts of surrounding land were later purchased, so
that a 1910 guide describes the cemetery as having grown to a little over 273
acres, divided into 39 sections.
Modern
publications give a figure of around 300 acres, divided into 48 sections with
fifteen miles of roadways. The area is carefully landscaped with well
established trees, and is a haven for wildlife. Over 132,000 are buried there.
Perhaps the most famous resident is Stephen Foster, the nineteenth century
composer.
Although
the cemetery location was chosen to be well outside the metropolis, inevitably the
city encroached around it and then way beyond it. Today it is a very useful
green space with some forestry, as well as a cemetery, in the middle of an
urban area. It is located in the Lawrenceville neighbourhood of Pittsburgh,
bounded by Bloomfield, Garfield and Stanton Heights. Its official address is
4734 Butler Street.
The
original prospectus allowed for the purchase of individual graves or family
plots. The prevailing sizes of the latter were 150, 225, 300, or 500 square
feet each. A 150 square foot lot was for six graves, using wooden rough boxes
only, a 225 foot lot was for eight interments and a 300 foot one for ten
burials.
So
finally we come to the Russell family.
We
know that Charles Tays Russell (CTR’s uncle with variant spelling for the middle
name) came to Allegheny and founded a business in 1831, assuming his obituary
is accurate. He joined the Third Presbyterian Church, Pittsburgh, on 22 January
1834.
Other
family members gravitated to the same area. His older brother James G Russell was
in the New York area in the early 1830s, but is listed in the 1840 Pittsburgh
area census. James Russell’s plans on moving to the Pittsburgh area included
his extended family also staying there. Forever. Literally. He purchased a 300
square foot sized family plot in the brand new Allegheny cemetery, designed for
ten interments. As it worked out, only nine family members would eventually use
the site. The family plot is Section 7, Plot 17. Here is how it looks today.
There are eight stones for a total nine graves, all laid flat on the ground.
Back row: Mary (no marker),
Charles, James, Sarah
Front row: Joseph, Ann, Joseph Jr,
Lucinda, Thomas
The
first two interments were Sarah Russell in December 1846, followed a year later
by James himself in December 1847.
There
is a document in general circulation called the Relatives of Charles Taze
Russell, originally produced by Robert Speel, a Russell descendant through
Joseph Lytle Russell and his second wife Emma Ackley. This work could be called
a labor of love, produced in the pre-internet age, and seems to draw a lot of
early information from the Allegheny registers and the details found in Charles
Tays Russell’s last will and testament. But there is one significent error in
it. It lists Sarah Russell as the sister of James Russell, who bought the
family plot. However, Sarah was not his sister, but his wife. This is not clear
on the burial registers which give no details of familial relationships, but
below is the small headstone that still survives for Sarah.
Sarah, wife of Jas. G Russell, died Dec 14, 1846.
This
makes a lot of sense. James would purchase the family plot because first: he
was the oldest in the family, and second: because his wife Sarah was dying or
had died. James was born ten years ahead of Charles Tays Russell and seventeen
years ahead of Joseph Lytle. As the oldest and to our knowledge the first-born,
he would normally have taken the lead. However, he was to die comparitively
young and hence disappears from the narrative before our CTR was even born.
Sarah
Russell was originally Sarah Ann Risk from Faun, Ireland. Her father was an
excise officer in the old country. She married James in the early 1830s and they
reportedly lived first at Elmwood Hill, New York. Her sister, Margaret Risk
married James’ brother Alexander. Alexander is outside the scope of this
article in that his life in America was spent in New York and New Jersey.
However, since his picture has survived and I have permission to reproduce it,
here it is:
Alexander Grier Russell, an older brother of Joseph
Lytle Russell.
Returning
to the Allegheny cemetery, as indicated above it started with around a hundred
acres of land and has grown to about three times that size today. But initially
the take-up was small. In the first year, 1845, from the start in September to
the end of the year there were only eight burials in total.
In
1846 there were only 29 new interments. These included Sarah Russell. One must
assume that James had the pick of many potential family plots; his choice then being
dictated partly by cost, but also by situation and outlook. However, total interments were 67 that year,
because there were also 38 re-burials. It was common in the early days to remove
bodies from city cemeteries at the request of relatives, who wanted a more
congenial final resting place for their whole family.
So
by the end of 1846, a grand total of 75 burials or re-burials had taken place
at the cemetery. Sarah died of consumption in the December; her burial
registration number is 73.
Almost
exactly one year later, in December 1847, James died. His burial registration
number is 264. He was laid to rest next to Sarah in the top row of two on the
plot, the one furthest from the roadway. James died of paralysis, so one
assumes he suffered a fatal stroke at the age of 51. Here is the small stone grave marker for
James.
James G Russell.
So
that made it two down, and eight places left to go in the family plot (only seven
of which were eventually taken up).
By
the time James died Joseph Lytle (sometimes spelled Lytel) Russell was living
in Pittsburgh. The Pittsburgh Daily Post newspaper started a regular column in
1843 listing the names of all those who needed to collect mail from the
Pittsburgh post office. In the issue for Monday, October 16, 1843 (repeated in
the following two daily issues) we find both Joseph L Russell and James
Russell.
A
month later in the issue for Saturday, November 18, 1843, we find the other
brother, Charles T Russell, also being asked to collect his mail.
Joseph
joined the same church as his brother Charles Tays, the Third Presbyterian,
Pittsburgh, on March 7, 1845. And it was his branch of the family who would use
the site next. The Allegheny Cemetery charter laid down strict legal provisions
for inheritance of family plots – first to children (James and Sarah did not have
any) then to parents (assumed to be long dead in the old country), and then to brothers
and sisters.
In
common with many in those unhealthy times, Joseph and his wife Ann Eliza were
to lose three of their five children quite early on. Thomas, pictured on the
left in the January 1, 1912 WT photograph was the first – he died of whooping
cough and was buried in a row nearest the roadway in front of James and Sarah’s
graves.
Thomas and Charles
The
cemetery record states he died in August 1855 at the age of five years and
three months. While not something to pursue here, it should be noted that the
1850 census returns suggest Thomas was born around January of 1850. That would
make him five years and eight months when he died. It’s possible that the
crabby handwriting and fading ink of the era caused someone at some point to
confuse a three and an eight.
Thomas
B Russell had been the firstborn, and was no doubt named after his maternal
uncle, Thomas Birney, who lived in Pittsburgh. He was followed by Charles Taze
Russell in 1852 (both Charles and Taze being an obvious nod to his paternal uncle,
Charles Tays) and then Margaret Russell in 1854. Charles and Margaret survived
to adulthood of course, and were finally buried side by side, but elsewhere.
Then
a young daughter named Lucinda was born (probably a nod towards Thomas Birney’s
sister Lucinda). She died from scrofula (sometimes spelled scrophula), a form
of tuberculosis affecting lymph nodes in the neck, in July 1858 at the age of a
year and a half. Lastly, there was a young son, Joseph Lytle Jr, who died of
croup at the age of six months in April 1860. The family had been living and
working in Philadelphia at this point, but it was still important to the family
to bring the little bodies back to the Allegheny cemetery for burial in the
family plot.
For
the three children, three sad little gravestones survive, but they are very
weathered and the memorial inscriptions on them have all but gone. On the one
reproduced below you can just make out the figures 1857 and 1858, so this would
be the grave marker for Lucinda.
Finally,
after losing her three children, mother Ann Eliza died from consumption in
January 1861. Her funeral took place from the home of her brother, Thomas
Birney, in Pittsburgh. Her will, written just the month before, when she was no
doubt very ill, lists her husband, Joseph Lytle, as “her agent in
Philadelphia.” The notice of death in the Pittsburgh Gazette for January 26,
1861 calls her the wife of Joseph L Russell (of Philadelphia, PA).
Her
grave stone survives, although it is worn in places. It reads:
ANN ELIZA
WIFE OF
JOSEPH L RUSSELL
DIED (indistinct) 1861
IN THE 39 YEAR OF
HER LIFE
There
is an inscription at the bottom – probably taken from a scripture – but
indecipherable today.
After
Ann Eliza’s death, the family plot remained unused for nearly fifteen years.
During this time, CTR and his sister grew to adulthood, and CTR started his
spiritual journey in earnest.
Then,
in 1875, the original Charles Tays died. His life story, such as we know it, is
covered in an earlier article on this blog – The Other Charles T Russell. Charles
Tays died of hepatitis in December 1875 and was buried in the family plot. The
grave was positioned in the top row, next to James and Sarah, whose funerals
had been 30 years before. Charles Tays’ grave stone is quite well preserved.
It reads:
IN MEMORY OF
CHARLES TAYS RUSSELL
A NATIVE OF
COUNTY DONEGAL, IRELAND
DIED
AT PITTSBURGH PA
DEC 28 1875
IN THE 70 YEAR
OF HIS AGE
Eleven
years went by before the next interment. The extended Russell family who
settled in Pittsburgh included an unmarried sister, Mary Jane Russell. Mary had
been housekeeper for her brother, Alexander Russell, in New York after the
death of his wife, but on Alexander’s death in the 1870s she moved to
Pittsburgh to live. Joseph Lytle probably took over managing her care. When
Charles Tays died, he left $3000 in a trust fund for Mary’s support. By 1886
the plan had gone awry and it was necessary to dip heavily into the capital to
care for her. But within a week of the documentation being drawn up, Mary was
dead. She died in September of 1886 and was buried in the top row next to her
brother Charles Tays. No stone was provided.
There
was only one more person who would share this final resting place, CTR’s father,
Joseph Lytle. Joseph had re-married (his second wife being CTR’s wife’s sister)
and they had one child, Mabel, who was to live until 1961. The family moved
from Pittsburgh to Florida, but Joseph Lytle then returned to Pittsburgh shortly
before his death, likely so he could die there. He was buried alongside his
first wife and the three children who had died before them.
Joseph’s
stone reads:
FATHER
JOSEPH L RUSSELL
BORN IN IRELAND
JULY 4 1813
DIED IN ALLEGHENY
DEC 17 1897
The
inscription at the bottom reads: Blessed and holy are all they who have part in
the first resurrection. They shall be Kings and Priests with God.
And
that was it, as far as the Allegheny cemetery plot was concerned; a total of
nine interments out of a possible ten. The years went by, it became forgotten, and
grass encroached over the stones lying flat on the ground; until more recent
times when the plot was rediscovered. The memorial inscriptions for Joseph
Lytle and Charles Tays are in the best condition today, but of course they are
the most recent.
So
why didn’t CTR end up buried here with his family in the one remaining space?
I
have no way of knowing how carefully to scale the chart of graves reproduced
with this article may be, but if accurate, it might appear that squeezing in
another interment could be problematic. Probably more to the point, CTR was
involved in founding a new cemetery.
The
Rosemont, Mount Hope and Evergreen United Cemeteries were founded on land
purchased from what was called the Wiebel farm in 1905. One section in the
Rosemont Cemetery was earmarked for Bible Student use. In his will, written in
1907, CTR directed that he be buried there. By the time of his death in 1916 the
area was simply called United Cemeteries. His sister Margaret (or Margaretta) R
Land was buried next to him in 1934.
But
that needs to be the subject of another article.
Postscript
It
should be noted that elsewhere in the Allegheny cemetery are other relatives of
CTR. His maternal uncle Thomas Birney (from whose home his mother’s funeral was
conducted) was also buried here in 1899. There is a family plot in Section 24,
lot 46. In the same grave (grave 1) as Thomas (1830-1899) is Thomas’ wife Mary
Ann Birney (1832-1906).
The
Birneys had at least five children and two daughters never married. They are
buried in this family plot, Eve Birney (died 1950) and Mary Birney (died 1953).
