Astonishing Visit to Bethel United Methodist Church!

Sue Bennett giving us background history of
Bethel United Methodist Church.

Our class heads out for another graveyard adventure to Bethel United Methodist Church! Not only did we see the graveyard, but the wonderful Sue Bennett took us into the church as well! We got to see the sanctuary, as well as some behind the scenes of the historical side of the church.

Bennett is a Charleston tour guide and she has her own website that you can find here! She knows a lot about Charleston history and loves sharing it with people! She also works at Bethel United Methodist Church as an administrator and gave us a tour of her own workplace!

Bennett shared with us, "This is in the 1850s, church members may own enslaved people, church pastors may not." I thought this was interesting because I figured that everyone could own slaves during this time.

She follows up her statement with, "What happens when a pastor's wife dies, he marries a lady who is a widow, who owns two enslaved people? She becomes his property as well as the enslaved people... Therefore with that and many other things going on, Bethel Methodist Episcopal Church becomes Methodist Church South." This is the church we went to February 19!

Inside of the church and our view from the
balcony. Suchan amazing view!

As we continued our tour, Bennett took us inside of the church and it was astonishing! The church is very different from our modern churches, so anyone could tell that it has history behind it. Bennet tells us, "[The church] would look very similar to what you see now, [from back then]."

After we took our tour, our class was to take pictures of some grave markers and identify the symbolism and what type of grave marker of each one. There were many to choose from, but we chose 10 of them to use for our blog posts.

This particular grave marker was William
H. Fleming D.D, a pastor at the
church in 1870.

This grave marker is considered a cradle because of the small walls outlining the grave. On the top part, there is a Bible on top of a podium and this usually symbolizes a person's good deeds. It also can symbolize that this person was very religious.

In this case, the man buried here was very religious because he was the pastor of the church. He died of gangrene lungs on April 16, 1877. He was born in Charleston county and died in Charleston county, being the minister of this church for 36 years in total.

 

This is one of the headstones laid on the wall
because of the earthquake that happened in 1886.

The woman who lies here is Priscilla Sarah Eason, born on June 28, 1809, died March 10, 1885. This type of grave marker is a headstone. The crown on the cross represents victory and Christianity.

Another headstone laid on the wall with
beautiful symbolism.

This dove represents a messenger of God, as well as peace. This woman, Elizabeth M. Ainger, was born on October 14, 1807, and died October 6, 1872. This headstone shows that she was a mother and the symbolism was meant to show that she is laying at rest, in peace.

Elizabeth M. who aged to be 65 years old and
she died in her sleep.

A close up to be able to see the detail of the
angel and all of the symbolism.

     Here is a headstone with an angel with her hand on her heart. This symbolizes a guide to heaven. This type of grave marker is a headstone that was possibly standing at one point and now it lies like a ledger. There is so much more symbolism shown on this grave marker.

James F.M. Lord, who died on February 16,
1862. He died at the age of 37.

This is another headstone with a weeping willow. The weeping willow symbolizes sadness and mourning. Even the name of the tree represents sadness. This is a beautiful, heart touching grave marker found at the church.

This very small headstone is one of the grave
markers that was saved due to the pave over
of the parking lot, along with many other ones. 

The finger pointing up on this headstone represents the hope of heaven. Even though it is very small, it shows a lot of symbolism. Casey Poyas's headstone was placed against the wall, but it was placed as close to the grave as possible, as Bennett told us.

The font of the words are hand carved and look more fancy
than other grave markers. This is another way to see that
an England carver made this.

This particular headstone was carved by someone in England. These designs are usually done by the carvers in England. We were told this from Ruth Miller in our past class on February 12.

The angel head with the wings beside it represents emerging triumphant from death. It is also known as the Death's Head.

Capt. Joseph Hunt is buried here and died
January 12, 1822 at the age of 45.

There are multiple types of symbolism on this headstone, but the urn is the base of the tree and it represents mourning. As before, the weeping willow represents sadness. These two together make the symbolism more powerful and meaningful

Charles C. Seyle, born July 12, 1823, died
February 10, 1880.

The thorns around the cross represent the suffering of Christ for our sins. This is a headstone that cracked and was probably standing at one point, but is laid down due to natural disaster.

Eva Lee, died on September 17, 1893, died
at the age of 26.

This die on base has a beautiful flower plant with a broken stem on the bottom right. The broken stem represents that someone has died at a young age. This woman died at a very young age, 26.

Rosa Mary, born October 9, 1835, died
November 2, 1881.

This drapery cloth symbolizes mourning and sorrow. The type of grave marker is a die in socket. There is also an arrangement of flowers on the grave marker and this represents love and grief.

There is a quote at the bottom that reads, "A brighter home than ours, in heaven, is now thine own." This is so beautiful and thoughtful for the woman who is laid here.











This visit was very interesting and we learned so much about the church, thanks to Sue Bennett! For any other details on the Bethel United Methodist Church graveyard click here!

Works cited:
Santore, Beth. “Gravestone Symbolism.” Gravestone Symbolism, www.graveaddiction.com/symbol.html.

Neighbors, Joy. “A Grave Interest.” Blogspot, 9 Sept. 2011, agraveinterest.blogspot.com/2011/09/symbols-flowers-and-frailty-of-life.html.

Charleston Graveyard History from the Remarkable Ruth Miller!

Charleston has so much intriguing history! Our class had the chance to hear the history from the woman who knows it as well as the back of her hand, Miss Ruth Miller! Ruth Miller came to visit our class last Monday and shared what she knows best, Charleston graveyards! She is a wonderful Charleston tour guide and has been since 1979! For more information on her, click on this link!

Ruth Miller's presentation on Charleston
graveyards and the history of them.

From the beginning, when Ashley Cooper and John Locke were encouraging people to live in Charleston. To the graveyards of Charleston that we know today! Ruth Miller explained to us how Charleston came about. She also explained to us how graveyards are significant now, as they were in the past through historical context! There were a couple of things that stood out to me and I thought were interesting during this lecture.

The three incentives that attracted settlers to Charleston by Lord Ashley Cooper were:
1. Free Land- where any man who came to the colonies were given land to white men.
2. Titled nobles- the declaration of the eight proprietors (Lord Ashley being one), gave them the right to settle the colonies and give acres to each man.
3. Freedom of religion (this is what helped churches come about in Charleston), for a religion to come about, it only took 7 people.
These three incentives are the foundation of Charleston and how it grew and continued to grow within the 1660s.

"There is no segregation in our churches before the Civil War." To think that there was no segregation before the Civil War is interesting. I did not know of this until Miller spoke to us. African Americans didn’t have the same rights as white men, but there was still no segregation. The African Americans had to sit upstairs in the balcony of the churches.

One of the things that Miller stated was "African Americans were never buried in a churchyard properly." It is obvious that during this time period that this would be accurate, but I thought that it was sad. There are no graveyards in Charleston that have African Americans with a labeled grave marker. This is very heartbreaking for families with ancestors who lived and died in Charleston that they may have known of.

If there were any African Americans buried in the churchyard, they would eventually get paved over, just to be forgotten. It is awful that this was something going on during the time period, but I believe that this was definitely one of the things that stood out to me. It was unfair for the African Americans. Even in churchyards now, you will not see an African American grave marker.

This is a picture of Ruth Miller and I,
after she spoke with us.

Ruth Miller told us, "Tombstones tell a story." This is something that I decided to put into this blog because we are discussing symbolism and grave markers now! It is so cool how each tombstone can be so simple or small, but they really do tell a story! We may not know the details behind what we do see on the tombstones. We can tell that there was effort put into them so we have an idea of who they were, what they did, or represented.

If anyone in Charleston gets the chance to go on one of her tours, take the shot! It was very interesting and I loved hearing from her! She loves what she does and she loves sharing it with others! For more information on her tours, click here!