Cemeteries

"O lord, you have freed us from the fear of death. You have made the end of life here the beginning of true life for us. For a time, you gave rest to our bodies in sleep and you awaken us again with the trumpet. The dust from which you fashioned us with your hands you give back to the earth for safekeeping. And you will recall it, transforming with immortality and grace our mortal remains." - Saint Macrina

Holy Cross Cemetery Stones, digital photograph, Holy Cross Historical Trust, accessed Oct. 9th, 2020, < http://www.holycrosshalifax.ca/database/db_construction/development/>

The late 18th century was a transformative period for the Catholic community in Halifax. In 1783, the colonial government passed the “Nova Scotia Catholic Relief Act,” which legalized land titles held by Roman Catholics and removed the legal penalties that had been held against priests for many years. The law also allowed the congregation to build a chapel dedicated to St. Peter's in downtown Halifax (the precursor to Saint Mary’s Cathedral) and establish a cemetery on consecrated ground beside their church. The cemetery roughly falls under where the current parking lot for the Basilica, which was created in 1950. Interestingly, the old Memorial Library, just across the street from Saint Mary’s, is also built over top of a cemetery, the burial ground for the Halifax Poor House.

Halifax Burial Ground Cemetery Archaeology, digital photograph, CBC News, accessed Oct. 9th, 2020 < https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/nova-scotia/jonathan-fowler-halifax-burial-ground-cemetery-archeology-1.5471209>

This cemetery was in use until the 1840s, when construction began on Saint Mary’s Cathedral. This forced the relocation of the cemetery to a new site to accommodate the much larger Cathedral, which dwarfed the previous church. The Diocese then established Holy Cross Cemetery as the new burial ground for Halifax Catholics. A very small number of burials at the old cemetery were re-interred in Holy Cross, and a number were buried by the construction or later paved over by the parking lot. Interestingly, there are some air photographs of downtown Halifax that show grave markers visible by the Cathedral into the 1920s, almost eighty years after it ceased to be used, with one marker visible as late as the 1970s (this was removed shortly thereafter and added to the permanent collection of the Nova Scotia Museum).

Unfortunately, cemetery records from the 1780s and 1790s have been lost to time, as well as the period immediately preceding its closure. However, surviving records from 1801 onwards detail the burial of 2,578 men, women, and children prior to its closing in 1843. From these records, we can also see that of those 2,578 souls, just over 900 were Irish immigrants, and another 257 were soldiers in the British Army. There are also 17 recorded African burials, and four Mi’kmaq burials. Of the people interred in the cemetery, perhaps the most notable is Pierre Maillard, noted Catholic missionary and linguist. Fr. Maillard was originally buried in the Old Burying Ground on Barrington Street, which at the time was the main cemetery of Halifax and under the control of St. Peter’s Anglican Church. Once a Catholic cemetery was finally established, his remains were moved across the street to their current location adjacent to Saint Mary’s Cathedral Basilica. Although a Catholic priest at a time when clerics were still heavily discriminated against by the British government, due to his good works and role as a peacemaker with the Mi’Kmaq people, he was accorded the dignity of a state funeral by the Governor of Nova Scotia. The Old Burying Ground itself would be closed the following year and replaced by Camp Hill Cemetery.

Holy Cross tombstone inscription, digital photograph, Saint Mary’s University, accessed Oct. 9th, 2020, < https://smu.ca/history/holy-cross/building-a-cemetery.html>