Wednesday’s child: “Little Charlie”

The grave of Charlie Leech (d. 1858) is next to the graves of his parents, W. G. Leech (d. 1884) and Jane Leech (d. 1864).

LITTLE
CHARLIE’s
GRAVE,
Son of
W.G. & J. LEECH
DIED
Aug. 2, 1858,
Aged 3 Ys. 29 ds.
The decorative carving looks like a lily and rosebud to me, but I’m not confident in that call. What do you see?

Oak Grove Cemetery, Delaware County, Ohio

An Odd Fellow

The marker at the grave of William Owston (d. 1866) has a carving of three links of a chain with the letters FLT, symbols associated with the Independent Order of Odd Fellows.

WILLIAM OWSTON
DIED
Sep. 15, 1866
AGED
63 Yrs. 3 Mo.
& 16 D’s.

The Independent Order of Odd Fellows (I.O.O.F.) is also known as “The Three Link Fraternity” for the three links that contain the letters FLT, which stand for Friendship, Love, and Truth.

In place of a typical epitaph is a touching message carved in small letters: Our Father is gone to meet our Mother.

A Find A Grave contributor suggests that Mr. Owston had three wives. FamilySearch.org data, including records for two marriages, is not contradictory.

So which wife is the “Mother” he has gone to meet?

(The Find A Grave contributor is an Owston descendant who writes that Jane Spink, the first wife, is the mother of all Owston children.)

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Oak Grove Cemetery, Delaware County, Ohio

Parenthetically speaking

Ever see parentheses on a gravestone? Take a close look at this one.

And while you’re at it, take a few minutes to admire those carvings: willow, urn, columns, and stars galore. Are those laurel sprigs decorating the marker’s “shoulders”?

REBECCA,
consort of
JAMES RANNEY,
died (a saint)
17, June 1833,
aged 43
years.
Unfortunately, the epitaph is covered with algae and lichen so I can’t make it out. Would no doubt be an interesting read, considering Mrs. Ranney’s saintliness.

Oak Grove Cemetery, Delaware County, Ohio

Silent Sunday: Green-roofed cemetery shed

Africa Cemetery, Delaware County, Ohio

A Freemasonry symbol bonanza

The gravestone for Joseph Jones (d. 1851) is near the foot of the hill at the front of Oller Cemetery. The large tablet stone is a bonanza of Freemasonry symbols.

In memory of
JOSEPH,
Son of
Abram & Sarah
JONES.
DIED
Jan. 6^, 1854.
It seems fitting to turn to a 19th-century book to understand the symbols and their meaning in the 19th century. Freemasonry: its symbolism, religious nature, and law of perfection by Chalmers Izett Paton (1873), available from Google Books, provides some help:

The Sun by his rising in the morning, calls us to labour; when he reaches his meridian, he calls us to refreshment; and by his setting at night, he calls us to repose.

A Star with five points is employed as a symbol to remind Masons of five important rules always to be observed.

The Square symbolises the trial of our conduct by the laws of morality.

The Level is a symbol reminding us of that level on which all men naturally stand in the sight of God, advancing alike towards death and eternity.

The Plumb is regarded as symbolic of truth, and so of rectitude.

The Compasses symbolically represent reason, which is exercised in framing our designs.

A Coffin ... is intended to remind us of the certainty of death, that we may so number our days as to apply our hearts unto wisdom.

Acacia—evergreen, the emblem of immortality—... teaches us to raise our thoughts above the present state of things and all their gloom, to that better world in which there is no death.

A second Google book, Masonic Review, Volume VIII, by C. Moore (1853) suggests a meaning of the G that hangs suspended between the star and the sun:

The suspended G, directs our thoughts above to the supreme Architect of the universe, and to a contemplation of the wonderful works of his Creation.

Oller Cemetery, Delaware County, Ohio