Annual Report for the Year 2019 of the Churchyard Committee

It is the responsibility of the Churchyard Committee to oversee the crypt, the churchyard, the parish’s plot at Waterside Cemetery, and any other function having to do with burials on Church property. The management of our colonial and contemporary burials and facilities, improving them and keeping them in good repair, and making provision for the burials of future generations of parishioners is a sacred trust and remains the committee’s focus. Our long-term planning may include a columbarium, possibly beneath the Church. For more information, please ask Father Andrew about the ad-hoc Columbarium Study Committee, and/or a copy of their 2019 report to the parish.

18th & 19th Centuries

There were approximately 77 parishioners buried in the Churchyard from the early eighteenth to the mid nineteenth century. Most burials are marked with upright carved head and foot bluestones characteristic of the period. All of the head and foot stones were photographed in the 1970s. Together with an estimated 25 burials in the colonial crypt beneath the church (the count may possibly be higher) we estimate that there were approximately 122 total burials at St. Michael’s through the 19th century.

20th and 21st Centuries

Some 46 years ago, in 1974, the first cremains were interred in St. Michael’s Churchyard, marked by flat bluestones. Today the total number of cremains interred is 23, an average about one interment every two years. This includes two interments that were made in 2019. At the current rate of interment, there are enough plots in the back-half of the Churchyard alone to provide space for more than 100 years. The Committee has long felt that adding cremains interments in the front-half of the Churchyard would compromise the historic colonial aesthetic, and therefore intends that the front-half be left as is.

Churchyard Policy

Plots in the Churchyard are sold on a needs-basis only, and remain an option for parishioners in good standing at the time of their death. Once an interment of a married couple is made, a plot adjacent to the first-to-die is reserved for the second-to-die.

A limited number of cremains spaces remain in the rear half of the churchyard and are available on a needs-only basis for parishioners in good standing at the time of their deaths. This needs-only policy may discourage some parishioners from electing a Churchyard interment, as they would like the certainty of pre-need planning. The price charged for an interment – which includes opening and closing a plot and a bluestone marker – is intended to be consistent with the Town of Marblehead fees for public cemeteries. Application is made to the Churchyard Committee, which submits a recommendation to the Vestry that in turn has final approval on each interment. Current fees and other information are available in the Parish Office.

Looking Ahead

The Churchyard is endowed in perpetuity by a bequest from, and donations made in honor of, the late Alma Martin Howie in 2011 and 2012. It is our hope that this und will enable us to maintain the churchyard – a hallowed place – for generations to come. We anticipate that the Churchyard will need some additional work in the coming years. This includes landscaping, as well as the restoration of at least two vertical markers that have largely sunken below grade, and the re-pointing of two above-ground crypts’ brick and stucco work.

Respectfully submitted,
Robert L. Howie, Jr.
Chair