Volume 2 No:22 (1966)

Found at the Charlotte County Archives, St.Andrews, NB

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Some people compile gravestone inscriptions with the same enthusiasm as others collect antique furniture. It is for these compilers as well as for those who are interested in the history of Charlotte County that we present the following:
 

"In Memory of Moses
Son of Moses & Phebe

  By fits of convulsion

My days were but 7

Christ died for sinners

And took me to heaven"

Taken July 12, 2001

Site

The little stone that bears the above inscription has stood for 160 years on Shaws Hill in St. George. This is a prominence that forms the eastern brow of the Magaguadavic River gorge over1ooking the falls. To see it you must go to the western end of Miss Albenia McKenzie's garden next to the Presbyterian Church. And there, anong the shrubs and trees and ferns, you will find it close to the steep edge of the gorge.

The Stone

The gravemarker is a gray slab of soft stone - perhaps marble or slate. The part above ground is 24 inches high, 13 inches wide and 2½ inches thick. It must extend underground to a considerable depth because it is perfectly erect. If its footing had been shallow the slab would have heaved with the frosts and it wou1d have been lying f1at on the ground long since.

The shape is graceful and the carving and lettering very neatly and professionally done. However, no maker's name is showing.   This may be inscribed on the underground part of the stone.

In spite of its age the stone shows little weathering and we had no difficulty like that experienced
with the Meloney gravestone in deciphering the inscriptions (Medcof, 1964). It may be that the Shaw stone is naturally resistant to erosion because ot its physical or chemical composition. Or the surrounding bushes and trees may have protected it from erosive forces--the sun, rain and sleet-- to which it would have been exposed in an open graveyard. Besides showing little erosion the stone is remarkably free of encrusting lichen growths. The same factors may have protected it from both.

    There are Shaws living near St. George and theirs is a very old Charlotte County family. Miss Edith Baldwin (1874- ) at St. George states that Moses and Phebe Shaw came to the town in the very early 1800's and that the brothers Tyler and Wallace,  and a sister Ann Shaw, came in 1812.
    These families lived near the Presbyterian Church and that is how Shaws Hill got its name. Spinney and Grearson (1964) state that there was a Shaw with the Peter Clinch settlers who founded St. George in 1786.

    Wallace and Tyler Shaw were brickmakers although we do not know the site of their brickworks. Wallace occupied the house in which Roy Johnson now lives on Shaws Hill. And Shaw bricks were used to build the house immediately across the street and now occupied by Dr.Dinsmore. Ann Shaw was evicted from this house by the sheriff after her brothers died, according to Miss Baldwin. Thereafter she lived with Thomas Goss, the town undertaker at that time.

    In St. Mark's (Anglican) cemetery there is a stone with. the following inscription, "Sacred to the memory of Tyler P. Shaw, Died Jan. 11, 1851, age 61 years, Farewell dear friend a short farewell, Till we shall meet again above, There endless joys and pleasures dwell, And the tree of Life bears fruits of love. L. S.  We assume that Tyler was a relative of Moses.

    In her unpublished manuscript,  "Early History of St. George", the late Mrs. Henry Johnson stated that little Moses Shaw was the first Loyalist baby born in St. George. However,  Spinney and Grearson (1964) indicate that St. George was settled about 1786. If this be true, Mrs. Johnson's claim is difficult to accept because little Moses died In 1805.

Medcof, J.C. 1964. The Meloney family burial plot, Navy Island, St. Andrews,N.B. Contributions from the Charlotte County Historical Society, No.15.

Spinney, Llewellyn and Anita Spinney Grearson. 1964. History of St. George. Ibid., No. 22.

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