Tombstone Tuesday

 

Hello and welcome to Tombstone Tuesday and also the Genealogy Blog Party Research Trip!

It's been a while since I blogged and I need to get back into the rhythm.  Bear with me while I find the flow again.  I'm going to practice with daily prompts.  We will see how long it lasts :)

Now, first up.  Confessions.  The tombstone above is not related to my family or that of my husband.  I just liked the sentiments at the very bottom...not sure if you can read them so here they are:

Reader, behold and see

How soon Death has conquered me

Prepare in time make no delay

For no one knows their dying day.

Too true, Magoo.

The above tombstone is located in Ipswich Cemetery.

I have recently retired (I think).  I may go back to work someday but during COVID, it's all too hard me-thinks.  Plus, I'm about to be a grandma so I want to be more available for my daughter and first grandchild.  Happy days indeed.

So, early retirement has also made me more available to do cemetery excursions with my lovely sisters-in-law and attend family history seminars via Zoom and the like.

We decided (at last) to venture forth to Ipswich Cemetery, which I understand is not for the faint of heart.

Poor old Ipswich Cemetery does not have anything as fancy as an index or directory to their graves.  The best you will find is here on this site and yes, this is the best map. Apparently, the records are not very good and they have faced many challenges over the years with maintenance.  There's an interesting story here about an underground crypt.  I am keen to look at a book written about the cemetery and its headstones - In Heavenly Garb.  And of course, if you are really keen, you can do a ghost tour.

We were looking for ancestors on my husband's side of the family: the Grieves and the Smiths to be precise.  We were lucky enough to find both sets of graves.  There is another one we would like to find but we may have to allocate another day for that one.

So - who did we find?  Well, we found the Smiths first up.  I did ring the Sexton's office before we went and they were very helpful.  They can't always help; particularly, if your ancestor doesn't have a headstone.  On this occasion, we were very lucky.

I have taken several photos so that if we want to go back we can find them more easily next time.  It's amazing what you forget over the years.  This is the gravestone for Patrick and Clara Patricia Smith, my husband's mother's paternal grandfather and aunt.  Clara was Patrick's daughter.  I have written about Patrick's funeral notice here on the blog. Patrick's wife Frances is buried at Toowong Cemetery and that grave is on the To-Do list as well.

The next grave we found was very interesting because we found it twice if that makes sense.  The grave is actually in the Pioneers section but because it is so old, we believe that descendants have made new plaques which are in the ground quite close to where all the Pioneers headstones are now.  Perhaps the plaques are located where the original grave was.  We don't know the story obviously.  Here are photos of the Grieve family plaques and the original pioneer headstone.

These graves are at the other end of the cemetery from the Smiths graves.  I have blogged about Ernest's death previously here and the Taits and the Grieves here and here.

How's your research going?  Have you found any tombstones lately?  You always think they're going to be around forever don't you but our recent trip to Ipswich made us realise how fragile even tombstones are and what a lot of maintenance they require to be preserved.

And just to end off this post, I include a gratuitous photo of a great big lumbering plane which did endless loops around the cemetery (the RAAF base is nearby) so, if you are having trouble convincing your nearest and dearest to accompany you to Ipswich Cemetery, you may be able to entice them with the promise of some plane spotting.  Patricia took these photos home to hubby and dear Terry identified it as a Boeing C-17 Globemaster III.  Thank you, Terry.  

And the last tombstone again is not one of our relatives but nevertheless, a very fine piece of stonemasonry.

I can highly recommend Ipswich City Council's Heritage Trails which you can find online here.  We had a lovely lunch at Queen's Park afterwards.  We really would have liked more time to explore but you know how it goes; hunting for gravestones can be quite tiring.  

Ipswich abounds in lovely places to explore and some good shopping.  Julie and I found an excellent wool shop in Brisbane Street.  And there is a fun place to have coffee afterwards.  Did I mention the excellent shoe shop next door?  And I am sure the folk at Ipswich Genealogical Society would be very helpful with research too.  See!  Now you want to go to Ipswich.