Description

CEM 218-Rev_bartonville_cemetery

Street Address: 1955 King St
Community: Hamilton
Township: Barton Township (Concession 3, Lot 1)
Locality: Wentworth County
Municipality: Hamilton
Province: ON

The Bartonville Cemetery site marks the earliest beginnings of the congregation of Pioneer Memorial United Church.

Circa 1824, pioneers, meeting under the leadership of Methodist Episcopal Church circuit preachers, built a wooden church which served them until it was destroyed by fire in 1846. On February 6, 1859, a brick church at the cemetery was moved in 1895 to Tweedside, where it now stands.

In the 1950’s, the population growth created the need to build a larger church building. On January 18, 1959, a new church, built across from this cemetery, was dedicated as Pioneer Memorial Church to honour those pioneers who built so that future generations might be the beneficiaries.

In 1952, the City of Hamilton assumed responsibility for this cemetery.

Some additional history of the Bartonville Cemetery

The Crown Patent was awarded to Benjamin Fairchild in 1798 and was sold to Richard Beasley that same year. Finally, in 1854, the Methodist congregation purchased the property, from barber George Wilkinson. On the site, from 1824-1846, stood a log structure of the first Methodist Episcopal Church. The first known burial took place in 1842, for Archibald Carscallen. In 1854, a new red brick church was erected. Following the Church Union in 1879, the congregation moved to a new church on Kenilworth Avenue and the brick church was moved, up the mountain, to become Tweedside Methodist Church, which still exists and is owned by the City of Hamilton. The cemetery remains in use and a notable burial is of (Rev.) John Gage Waller, Anglican Missionary to Japan (1863-1945).