Front Cover

A Guide to Monuments, 

Memorials and

Burying Grounds

In Wellfleet 

Massachusetts

Introduction

In the beginning, Billingsgate was a collection of several villages on the lower Cape between Eastham and Provincetown.  Small settlements with a meeting house, a burial ground and often a school, grew up where fishing and farming were possible: on Bound Brook Island, near Gull Pond, around Duck Creek, and in South Wellfleet.  In 1763 inhabitants in these scattered European enclaves petitioned for independence from Eastham and incorporated themselves as the Town of Wellfleet.

In the two and half centuries since, local historians have recorded much about their Town.  Among the liveliest of these memoirs are Wellfleet, A Pictorial History, by Judy Stetson, first published in 1963 by the Wellfleet Historical Society and reissued in 2004 with additional chapters by Seth Rolbein; Wellfleet Remembered by Ruth Rickmers, 1993; and also Wellfleet Echoes, 1973 and More Wellfleet Echoes, 1978, by Earle Rich.

We on the Historical Commission hope this Guide, with annotated maps, will help our visitors and our neighbors locate surviving Monuments and Memorials that mark significant sites in our town that is still, to quote Thoreau's Cape Cod,  "east of America."

Title Page

A Guide to Monuments,

Memorials and

Burying Grounds

In Wellfleet, Massachusetts

compiled by members of the

Wellfleet Historical Commission

and published with the help of the

Wellfleet Historical Society

The Town seal shows the Pilgrims in the Mayflower's

shallop rowing into Wellfleet harbor where early

chronicle reports they startled "a group of native

cutting up blackfish on the shore."

Wellfleet Town Center

Town Hall Area

1. Wellfleet Harbor Plaque
2. Town Hall and Lost Peace Angel Sculpture
3. Town Hall Flagpole
4. Mile Markers
5. WCTU Water Fountain
6. Time Capsules
7. Wellfleet Cannon
8. World War II Honor Roll
9. Captain L. D. Baker Plaque

Main Street Area

10. John R. McKay Square
11. Officer Williams Plaque
12. Our Lady of Lourdes Church Doors
13. Lawrence Gardinier Square

[ 1 ] Wellfleet Harbor Plaque

This bronze marker, now on a boulder at entrance to Town Hall Parking lot, was presented to the Town of Wellfleet by the Provincetown Tercentenary Committee in 1920. It was originally mounted on Colonial Hall, the Second Congregational Meeting House bought by the Daughters of the American Revolution in 1913, and moved here in 1914 from its original site in the South Wellfleet burial ground.   Moved again across the parking lot in 1919 to house Town Offices, it was destroyed by fire during a blizzard in 1961. Rebuilt from original 1833 plans, it was enlarged and an elevator added in 1997.

South Wellfleet Congregational Meeting House, 1833,

from Bronze Plaque in South Wellfleet Cemetery

South Wellfleet Congregational Meeting House

Shown in this photograph taken about 1914, are Abbott Paine and

friends on fence in front of the then abandoned Meeting House

[ 2 ] Town Hall and Lost Peace Angel Sculpture

To celebrate the end of World War II, sculptor and long time Wellfleet Summer resident, Xavier Gonzalez created PEACE ANGEL and presented her to the Town in 1958. She was twelve feet long, fashioned from sheet aluminum which sadly melted in the 1960 fire that destroyed Town Hall.  A small cut paper model, from which this drawing was made, is preserved at the Wellfleet Historical Society Museum on Main Street.

[ 3 ] Town Hall Flagpole

The original flagpole was the mainmast salvaged from the vessel Quannapowitt, wrecked on the backshore in 1913.

[ 4 ] Mile Markers

On this Town Center Marker the arrows had to be reversed when post was moved from across the street to Town Hall lawn; Plymouth became 65 miles West, and Provincetown 12 miles North. There is another Mile Marker on Route 6 at the Eastham/Wellfleet town line, and a third at Wellfleet/Truro line.

[ 5 ] WCTU Water Fountain

The Women’s Christian Temperance Union donated this drinking water fountain to the Town in 1948. Mary Freeman, representing the Wellfleet Chamber of Commerce, is shown accepting the gift. Following the 1960 fire, the fountain was relocated to the present site to the right of the driveway and sadly flows no longer.

To the right of the Town Hall driveway

[ 6 ] Time Capsules

Buried in the ground close
to Town Hall front doors

Wellfleet Selectmen twice authorized placing Time Capsules containing local memorabilia on the Town Hall lawn. The first was buried in 1963 during Wellfleet’s 200^th Incorporation Anniversary Celebration, and was opened in 2013 during the 250^th Anniversary celebration; the second, placed in 1976 during America's bicentennial celebration, will be opened in 2076 AD.

[ 7 ] Wellfleet Cannon

Probably mounted on a privateer from Wellfleet during the War of 1812, this “Nine Pounder” was cast at Henry Foxhall’s foundry in Georgetown, Maryland, in the late 1700s. Historian Edwin N. Rich of Wellfleet designed the reproduction of the original wooden mount.

[ 8 ] World War II Honor Roll

Inside Town Hall on Wall in Lobby

“Dedicated to the Citizens of Wellfleet, Massachusetts

Who Served their Country in World War ll – Lest we forget – This

tablet is the Expression of the Love

and Admiration of Mary K. Lawrence.”

ARMY

Zenas J. Adams, Jr.	Edward B. Lane, Jr.
Ethelyn H. Atwood	Alexander J. Lussier, Jr.
Ester F. Bell	Arthur E. Lussier
Fred S. Bell	Fred Moran
Richmond R. Bell	Alvah L. Murphy
Edwin C. Berrio	George W. Murphy
James A. Berrio, Jr.	Malcom I. Murphy
Norman F. Berrio	Clarence M. Murphy
Laurence E. Cardinal	Cecil E. Newcomb, Jr.
Albert R. Carey	Robert E. Newcomb
Franklin P. Chase	Raymond E. Nickerson
David Chavchavadze	Lillian V. Pentinen
James G. Curran, Jr.	Thomas R. Pickering
William H. Dalby	Leonard A. Price
Earl Daley	Allan R. Putnam
Alice F. Daniels	Robert W. Putnam
Edmund A. Davis	Wilbur R. Rockwell
Letitia O. DeGroot	Donald F. Rose
Julian A. Dickey	Lawrence J. Rose
Paul C. Dyer	Charles R. Silva, Jr.
Alfred A. Faust	Clayton E. Smith
Benjamin E. Freeman	Emerson R. Snow
Norman W. Gill	Howard K. Snow
John T. Hall	Kenneth A. Snow
Charles T. Hatch	Martti I. Suomi
Lois L. Higgins	Walter A. Taylor
Edwin I. Hill	William W. Taylor
Walter J. Hill	Eino A. Thompson
Lucille G. Horton	Wilfred J. Trahan
Althena M. Howland	John Wiles
Elwood M. Howland	Rudolph L. Woidell
Fred A. Howland	Norman C. Young
Hernaldo R. Kelley

NAVY

Everett G. Adams	Paul J. Lussier
Franklin J. Adams	Donald P. Moran
Floyd F. Atwood	Arthur J. Murphy
Robert H. Atwood	James Murray
Oliver L. Austin, Jr.	Paul G. Murray
Arthur F. Bacon	Edward A. Nickerson, Jr.
Clarence J. Berrio	Chester W. Nimitz, Jr.
George E. Berrio	Kenneth E. Paine
Richard L. Berrio	Miriam M. Pentinen
Thomas A. Cosgrove	Wallace I. Pierce
Clifford H. Dalby	Joseph J. Redman
Willis A. Dill	Earl G. Rich
William K. Dyer	Elisa Robbins
Berkley A. Eastman	Edward R. Rose
Frederick G. Eastman	Wilbur H. Ryder, Jr.
Ronald G. Eastman	Charles R. Shuster, Jr.
Charles M. Echeverria, Jr.	Clarence S. Smith
Durand Echeverria	Eugene F. Sullivan
Charles E. Frazier, Jr.	Elwood S. Taylor
Henry P. Gill	John P. Tiernan
Clifford M. Hatch	Martha H. Underhill
Alfred L. Hill	Ansel A. Valli, Jr.
Clifton P. Hopkins, Jr.	Virginia M. Valli
James R. Howland	John N. Wade
Charles W. Huntley	Walter S. Wade
Franklin A. Lane	Arlie L. Wiles
Theodore J. Laubacker	Wilton L. Wiles, Jr.
Edward E. Lombard	Frank A. Wiley

COAST GUARD

Winfred M. Baumgarten	Robert W. Lombard
Russell F. Berrio	Jordan Orr
Leon E. Dayon	Howard R. Pickering
Daniel Dorey	George G. Pierce
Luther J. Ellis	Wilfred E. Rogers, Jr.
Warren L. L. Ellis	William F. Silva
Anthony L. Ferreira, Jr.	William A. Snow
Sherwood M. Fisher	Ansel A. Valli
William E. Joseph	Ben Wolf

MARINES

Leander E. Dorey	Kenneth L. Rose

MERCHANT MARINES

Cyril W. Downs, Jr.	Cleveland L. Farnham

RED CROSS

Paul L. Chavchavadze

[ 9 ] Captain L. D. Baker Plaque

In Town Hall Lobby

Lorenzo Dow Baker was born in Wellfleet in 1840 and attended the Bound Brook Island School until at age ten, he went to sea as a fisherman. As a young man, Captain Baker revolutionized the fruit industry by demonstrating that bananas could be shipped long distances. In his Boston Fruit Company, later absorbed by the United Fruit Company, he combined a fleet of Wellfleet based ships, with a network of Caribbean banana plantations in a successful multinational enterprise.  Later, retired from active shipping, he played an influential role in developing Wellfleet as a summer resort.

This plaque, presented to the town by The United Fruit Company, honors this daring, entrepreneurial, compassionate seaman whose many imaginative enterprises uniquely enriched his hometown.

Captain Baker is buried in Pleasant Hill Cemetery with his wife, Martha Matilda (Hopkins) and their daughter, Martha Alberta.

[ 10 ] John R. McKay Square

At Junction of Main
and Bank Streets

John R. McKay was born in Wellfleet on February 21, 1892.  He enlisted in the U.S. Navy during World War I and died of pneumonia at the Chelsea Naval Hospital in October, 1918.  In 1924 the Town voted unanimously to name the square at the junction of Bank and Main Streets in his honor and appropriated $100 to erect a suitable marker. When the Sparrow residence was torn down to make way for construction of a commercial building, now Wellfleet Marketplace and Cappello’s Country Store, the marker was moved to its present site.

[ 11 ] Officer Charles D. Williams Plaque

On Bulletin Board at
282 Main Street

In Memoriam

Officer Charles D. Williams,
Wellfleet Police Department

“At this location on the morning of July 18, 1931 Officer Williams was killed in the line of duty while directing traffic. This plaque is dedicated to Officer Williams and to all of Wellfleet’s police officers who dutifully protect and serve the residents and visitors of the Town of Wellfleet”

On July 18, 1996, the 65th Anniversary of this incident, the Wellfleet Police Officers Association erected this memorial and also had a record of Officer Williams’ heroism inscribed on the Police Officers Monument in Washington, D.C.

[ 12 ] Our Lady of Lourdes Church

335 Main Street
(now Wellfleet Preservation Hall)

Fishermen from the Azores and Nova Scotia were the first to bring the Catholic faith to Outer Cape towns.

Services were held in private homes as early as the 1850s. In 1900 an abandoned one-room schoolhouse at the head of Duck Creek, near the present Cemetery, was bought to serve as Our Lady of Lourdes Chapel. Catholicism flourished and in 1910, Our Lady of Lourdes became a parish under the care of the Sacred Hearts Fathers from Belgium. In 1912, using some of the wood from the first chapel, parishioners built a new church on Main Street for $24,300. In 1989, the Sacred Hearts Fathers passed their responsibility to the Diocese of Fall River. The Church was closed in November 2000, and the parish subsequently relocated to a location on Route 6. The Diocese sold both the old church building and the parking lot across the street to the Town of Wellfleet. The old church building is now Wellfleet Preservation Hall, a community center, and the property surrounding the building is a public park.

In the early 1980s, the resident pastor allowed two itinerant artists to camp behind the Church. In return they created these carved and painted decorative doors.

[ 13 ] Lawrence R. Gardinier Square

At the Junction of Main Street
and Holbrook Avenue

Lawrence “Duffy” Gardinier was born in Waltham, Massachusetts on May 16, 1900, and lived all but the first three years of his life in Wellfleet. He served in the US Navy during World War I, and was a member of the Massachusetts State Guard during World War II. A man of numerous talents, he served the town in many capacities as a three term Selectman, Police Chief, Town Moderator, Deputy Sheriff, and Special Sheriff. One of his many projects was the design, installation, and maintenance of our unique town clock, which strikes the hours and half hours in ship’s bell time. He first proposed the idea to the Selectmen in early 1952, and the bells rang out on September 29,1952 from the steeple of the First Congregational Church. In 1953 Ripley’s Believe-It-Or-Not newspaper column described the new clock as “the only town clock in the world to strike on ship’s bells time”. “Duffy” passed away in 1973.

This square named in his honor was dedicated by the John R McKay Post 287, American Legion, on July 4, 1979 in tribute to “Duffy’s” long and devoted service to his town.

Main and East Commercial Streets to Harbor

14. Methodist Church Bell
15. Dr. Clarence J. Bell Square
16. Dr. George T. Wyer Memorial
17. Ship’s Bell Clock
18. First Public Library
19. Town Pump
20. Horse Trough
21. Wilbur H. Ryder Square
22. Anchor Memorial
23. Mercantile Wharf and Chequesset Inn
24. Taylor Hill Cemetery

[ 14 ] Methodist Church Bell

A first Methodist Meeting House was built in 1816 on the site of the present Pleasant Hill Cemetery. This larger Church, which had been extensively remodeled in 1863, was struck by lightning in 1891 and burned to the ground. The original cast steel bell, manufactured by “Naylor Vickery and  Co. 1859, of Sheffield E. Riepe’s patent”, survived and was placed on the church site to serve South lawn.  One of the most generous donors to the reconstruction fund was Captain Lorenzo Dow Baker.

On Easter Sunday, 1966, two stained glass windows designed by British artist, Claire Leighton, a Wellfleet resident for many years, were dedicated in memory of the family of Mrs. Annie B. Higgins who sang in the choir; her sister, Annie Higgins Wiley, had been the organist.

[ 15 ] Dr. Clarence J. Bell Square

Main Street and Whit’s Lane

The intersection of Main Street and Whit's Lane was dedicated on May 31, 1982 to the memory of Dr. Clarence J. Bell whose home and office were for many years in the house on the corner. He and his young wife came to Wellfleet in 1904.  He is believed to have delivered more than twenty-five hundred babies during his long career of devoted service to the people of his adopted town, whose gratitude is expressed by this memorial.

[ 16 ] Dr. George T. Wyer Memorial

On lawn across from
church on Main Street

Mrs. Elma A. Packard gave the original house on this site to the Congregational Church in memory of her father, Dr. Wyer, a homeopathic doctor who served this community in the early decades of the 20th Century.   The present parsonage was erected in 1964.

This memorial plaque was dedicated in 1967. A Linden tree growing about 30’ south of the Memorial is said to be from cuttings salvaged from the ship Franklin wrecked on the backshore on March 1, 1849. The Franklin carried a cargo of baled fruit, trees, and grape vines, many of which survive in local gardens.

[ 17 ] Ship’s Bell Clock

Our unique Town Clock, “the only Town clock in the world to strike on ship’s time,” *  was designed, installed, and maintained by Lawrence “Duffy” Gardinier in the steeple of the Congregational Church in 1952.

The first Billingsgate Meeting House on Chequessett Neck had been replaced in 1740 by a larger Meeting House with a second burying ground, now officially “the Old Town Cemetery” at the head of Duck Creek.

When the Town of Wellfleet was incorporated in 1763, townspeople voted “to support the ministry and a school.”

This present Congregational Church was built in 1850 here on Main Street, “with steeple and bell”, at a cost of $12,000.

Methodists who had built their own church on Main Street, were exempted from the portion of Town Taxes that supported “the ministry.”


 * So designated in RIPLEY’S BELIEVE IT OR NOT newspaper column

In Congregational Church
Steeple on Main Street

[ 18 ] First Public Library

“This room became the first public library in Wellfleet during the pastorate of Rev. Emory C. Chaddok from 1874 to 1879. Church members circulated books from this little room until 1893.”

Placed by friends of  the

Wellfleet Library

1974

Following acceptance of The Library Act of 1890 by the town, “1,827 books, with cases containing the same” were contributed by the Parish to the Workers’ Circulating Library, established in rooms over the Wellfleet Savings Bank, then on Bank Street.

Current Wellfleet Public Library logo

[ 19 ] Town Pump

At Junction of East Commercial
and Bank Streets

Commercial Street was at the center of Wellfleet’s busy Maritime Industry when the town pump and watering trough was installed in 1885. It provided water for horses and other livestock for many years, and for townspeople during hurricanes and other emergencies. When children waiting here for the School Bus couldn’t resist splashing passersby, the Selectmen turned off the water.

[ 20 ] Horse Trough

This stone trough belonged to Emmanuel Davis of South Wellfleet who gave it, in 1933, to the John RT. McKay American Legion Post to be placed in front of their newly constructed Legion Hall. The Legion Hall was sold in 1972 to the LEFT BANK GALLERY, but the watering trough remains the property of the American Legion.

[ 21 ] Wilbur H. Ryder Square

Junction of Commercial Street and Holbrook Avenue

Wilbur H. Ryder, Jr., born in Wellfleet in 1893, served in the Navy in both World War I and II. Elected Commander of the John R. McKay American Legion Post 287 in 1926, he became a Charter Member when the post was issued a permanent charter in 1928. He was 84 years old when he died in 1977. The American Legion dedicated this Square to his memory on July 4, 1979.

[ 22 ] Anchor Memorial

In grassy area at Mayo’s Beach between
beach Parking lot and Kendrick Avenue

This anchor, brought up off Truro in 1944 in the net of The Highland Light, a fishing vessel out of Wellfleet, rested for many years on the grass in front of the Wellfleet Historical Society Museum on Main Street. The Town Bicentennial Committee dissolved before plans to properly honor our maritime past could be carried out, so in 1981 members of the Historical Society placed the anchor here in memory of all the men who sailed from Wellfleet Harbor.

[ 23 ] Mercantile Wharf and Chequesset Inn

In 1885 Captain L.D. Baker bought Mercantile Wharf, no longer needed for much diminished fishing trade and converted it for use as The Chequesset Inn. Extending four hundred feet into Cape Cod Bay, each of the sixty two rooms had a water view. Staffed each summer by employees from his winter season Titchfield Hotel in Jamaica, the Inn became a popular resort for tourists arriving by train from all over New England. Bayside bathing, hiking on the dunes, and sailing at the Yacht Club, also founded by Captain Baker, were popular vacation activities. During the unusually cold winter of 1934, Wellfleet Harbor froze solid and wind-driven chunks of ice demolished the foundations of the wharf. The Inn fell into the Bay, leaving only the pilings now visible only at low tide.

On a boulder where Kendrick Avenue
turns at Keller’s Corner

[ 24 ] Taylor Hill Cemetery

In woods off Kendrick Avenue. Take right on Hiller Avenue to left on Summit Street, 

go left on Summit Avenue to sign at Harrison Avenue. Follow dirt road to left.

Inscriptions on various markers and stones indicate this is the probable site of the first Billingsgate Meeting House, where about 1721, a twenty-by-twenty foot structure was built and a burying ground laid out. Thomas Oakes, a physician from Boston, and his son, Josiah, said to have graduated from Harvard College, are buried here. By 1735 a second Meeting House and burying ground, “the Old Town Cemetery”, was in use at the head of Duck Creek. Members of the Wellfleet Historical Society have restored and preserved this site.

Great Island, Bound Brook Island and Area East of Route 6

Great Island:

25. Indian Woman’s Marker
26. Henderson Great Island Plaque

Bound Brook Island:

27. Atwood Higgins House
28. Bound Brook Island School
29. Lombard Cemetery
30. First School Marker
31. Wellfleet-Truro Boundary Stone

East of Route 6:

32. Pleasant Hill & Oakdale Cemeteries
33. Ship Jason Memorial

[ 25 ] Indian Woman’s Marker

This Memorial Marker, located close to the Great Island Parking lot, was dedicated during 1976 Bicentennial celebrations by members of the Wampanoag Tribal Council and the Wellfleet Historical Society.

The inscription that somewhat inaccurately asserts that Wampanoag tribal lands were “freely given” is partially obscured by a coating of black tar.

[ 26 ] Henderson Great Island Plaque

Follow Great Island walking trial
approximately 1.4 miles from Parking Lot

The inscription quotes Governor Bradford, and then adds the following:

“One of his descendants lived on, protected,
and loved this land. 1939 – 1962
 Priscilla Allen Bartlett 

Wife of Alexander I. Henderson”

Wampanoag and later English hunters erected look-out towers from which to spot blackfish and other whales along these wild dunes, now part of the National Seashore Park. A trail leads to the site where Smith’s Tavern is said to have sheltered weary sailors in the early 1700s.

[ 27 ] Atwood-Higgins House

Heading North on Old County Road take the first possible left-hand turn beyond Wellfleet Transfer Station. Continue up this dirt road for a tenth of a mile to sign on Left. Park and walk down hill to this National Historic Site.

This center chimney house was built about 1730 by Thomas and Solomon Higgins when Bound Brook Island was a busy fishing and farming community. Thomas, and later Jerusha Atwood, lived on the property from 1806 thru 1891 when it passed to Mary Ackerman who lost it to the Town of Wellfleet for unpaid taxes. Edward and Anthony Atwood, and Annie Atwood Cole reclaimed it in 1897. George Higgins owned it from 1919 until 1961 when property along Bound Brook was added as a seasonal National Seashore Park site.

[ 28 ] Bound Brook Island School

This memorial was erected in 1924 by Dr. Nehemiah Somes Hopkins. Born in 1860, he attended the one-room Island School with his three brothers, a half-brother, a half-sister Martha, and their friend, Lorenzo Dow Baker, who later married Martha. After medical school Dr Hopkins established an eye surgery practice in Oswego, New York, which he left to go to China in 1889. He and his wife, Fannie Blanchard Higgins, also from Wellfleet, went to serve in the Methodist Mission in China. In Peking he founded, in memory of his brother, The John L. Hopkins Memorial Eye Hospital, the first Western hospital built in China.

Dr. Hopkins dedicated fifty-eight years of his long life to medical missionary service in China, the last two years with his daughter, Helen, in a Japanese concentration camp during World War II.

He died at the age of ninety-three and was buried in Pleasant Hill Cemetery in May 1953.

Continue .3 of a mile beyond Atwood Higgins House to where “Kering Turpin” sign marks right turn-off; on left follow path about 100 feet uphill.

[ 29 ] Lombard Cemetery

At Kering Turnpin sign, take toad to the right and follow to a small

clearing, "parking area"; continue on foot several hundred feet on 

overgrown dirt road on the right, pastg a painted fence post to the Cemetery

Edward Lombard, a descendant, has one explanation for the remote location of this family burying ground which contains several stones from the late 1880s, marking graves of members of the Lombard family who lived and were buried here.

“Far out on Boundbrook Island is a cemetery of Lombards. They each and everyone died of small pox, and the fear that this dread disease might be wafted along with their departing souls prompted family members and neighbors to deny them interment in the old South Truro Cemetery where they rightly belonged.” *

* I Heard The Mighty Ocean Roar, E. Lombard, 1978

[ 30 ] First School Marker

Turn right on Old Route 6 just beyond the Truro town line; Take second right onto dirt road, passing under Power Lines twice; Proceed about 50 feet to Old King's Highway. Marker is about 20 feet to left on Old King's Highway.

You will be close to Wellfleet-Truro line and north of Black Pond.

A schoolhouse, “seating thirty two scholars,” was built here about 1798 to provide instruction to young people from Truro and Bound Brook Island.

[ 31 ] Wellfleet-Truro Boundary Stone

Continue up hill past First School Marker;

Stone Post marked T/W will be on right

before top of hill. Top of stone will be

visible above bushes.

Each town on The King’s Highway was required to maintain town line markers, and it was the Selectmen’s responsibility to annually inspect these markers by “walking the bounds”.

[ 32 ] Pleasant Hill Cemetery and Oakdale Cemetery

At stop light on Route 6 near Police/Fire Station,
take Gross Hill Road to Cemetery Road on left

Pleasant Hill Cemetery was established here in 1816 beside the Methodist Church, which in 1842 was rebuilt closer to the center of Town. In 1858 the Congregationalists developed Oakdale Cemetery under the leadership of Dr. Thomas Stone, when the Old Town Cemetery near the head of Duck Creek was no longer adequate.

A plaque on a post to the right of the main entrance to the cemetery tells us “This tablet given by bequest of and placed in honor of Frank R. Gill 1856 - 1915.” Frank R. Gill, born in Wellfleet, “became a spice grinder in Somerville, and he was of the 8th generation of the Gill line.”

---

Now a Memorial at the Gardinier plot toward the north end of Pleasant Hill Cemetery, this great granite grinding stone, measuring 5 feet in diameter, was sunk in Wellfleet Harbor where it served as a base for a mooring until Lawrence “Duffy” Gardinier retrieved it.

[ 33 ] Ship Jason Memorial

Turn right just beyond cemetery gate, then left;
Memorial is on hill behind crypt.

Dedicated on July 11, 1976 by the Wellfleet Bicentennial Committee, the Wellfleet Historical Society, and the Rich Family Association, this memorial honors the memory of sixteen English Sailors lost in the wreck of the British ship Jason; as well as the heroic service of the Pamet River Life Saving Crew in saving Samuel Evans, the one man who survived that terrible winter storm off the back shore in 1893.

South of Town Center & South Wellfleet

South of Town Center: Leonard Pierce Memorial Bridge Our Lady of Lourdes Cemetery Old Town Cemetery Boudro French Cemetery The Chapel of St. James the Fisherman South Wellfleet: Pond Hill School South Wellfleet Cemetery and Site of Second Congregational Church MIA Memorial Park South Wellfleet Fire Station Methodist-Episcopal Church Site Wireless Station Road Post Marconi Bust Marconi Wireless Station Site Joseph H. Schuldice Marker

[ 34 ] Leonard Pierce Memorial Bridge

Over Route 6 on Long Pond Road

Leonard A. Pierce was born in South Wellfleet in 1918. A pilot in the Army Air Force in the European Theatre during World War II, he was shot down twice. Each time he saved his crew. Returning to Wellfleet after the War he served as Selectman. He died in 1965 and was laid to rest in the South Wellfleet Cemetery. On February 13, 1998, the Selectmen voted to rename the Long Pond Bridge in his memory.

[ 35 ] Our Lady of Lourdes Cemetery

A Catholic chapel was established near here in the early 1900s in one of the original town schoolhouses, by then abandoned, and a new cemetery laid out adjacent to Old Town Burial Ground. In 1912 parishioners built Our Lady of Lourdes Church in the center of town.

[ 36 ] Old Town Cemetery

A second Congregational Meeting House was built here in 1740 on a knoll which slopes to the edge of the present highway, and a burial ground now known as “The Old Town Cemetery” was laid out. In the front section of this cemetery is a fenced memorial monument, “Erected to the memory of Wellfleet Heroes by the Ladies Soldiers Aid Society, assisted by subscribers to the War Fund 1866.”

[ 37 ] Boudro French Cemetery

From Route 6 at Post Office Square turn west on
Cove Road; take first right onto Sandpiper Hill Road

Fisherman from Nava Scotia had long been familiar with productive fishing grounds off Massachusetts and in the late 1800s many settled with their families on the lower Cape. This small family burial ground is one of many in use before Lady of Lourdes Catholic Cemetery was established.