We go there for a walk and rest: 5 hidden New York cemeteries that you did not know about

If you think that the streets of New York are crowded, then you simply have no idea what is going on underground. The publication shared the secrets of the underground life of the city New York Post.

Burial of the dead in New York has always been a difficult task: in a relatively small area of ​​the city, dozens of districts once served as cemeteries. One of the most popular was once considered a cemetery located near the Trinity Church in Manhattan (Manhattan's Trinity Church). There by 1822 about 125 thousand bodies were buried. The dead were usually buried shallow: some of the corpses rested at a depth of about 45 centimeters (18 inches) underground. To combat the stench, lime was used.

The city began to ban burial sites south of Canal Street in 1832, and in 1851 below the 86th Street.

If you are wondering if there are any plots of land in New York under which even the once-dead townspeople rest today, then the answer is yes. Here is a list of these cemeteries hidden from prying eyes:

1. James J. Walker Park

Hudson street at clarkson street

James J. Walker Park is a public park in Greenwich Village in Lower Manhattan, New York. Its area is about 2 acres (0,81 ha) and is bordered by Varick Street, Leroy Street, Hudson Street and Clarkson Street.

Inside the park there is a baseball field. The mayor of the city, James John Walker (who was mayor of New York from 1926 to 1932) helped make this sport legal. Today, children playing in this field are running around the earth, under which tens of thousands of bodies are still resting. Indeed, from 1812 to 1895 this site was used as a burial place by the Trinity Church.

In 1895, the parks department acquired land for $ 520 and turned it into St. John's Park. The bodies of the noble inhabitants were reburied, and those belonging to the lower and middle classes were not disturbed. The only remaining tombstone in the park is a monument in 1834 and a sarcophagus dedicated to the three firefighters who died during the battle with fire on Pearl Street.

2. Park Madisonsquare

Broadway at East 23rd Street

To this day, about 1300 dead New Yorkers are buried in this park underground.

The territory of the park, as in Washington Square, from 1791 to 1794 was used as a burial place for the poor. Many of the bodies buried here came from the nearby Bellevue Hospital and local almshouses.

In 1806, this land was used for the army arsenal, and was later converted into a parade ground without removing bodies.

By the way, here lies William Jenkins Worth - an American military, a participant in the Mexican War. He died of cholera in Texas in 1849.

3. Central Park

West 85th street

Once on the territory of the park there was the All Angels Church, opened in 1848, with a cemetery.

In 1857, this land was seized for the construction of the Central Park. But the bodies that rested there, it seems, no one touched. In 1871, workers who uprooted a tree discovered a coffin containing the remains of a 16-year-old church member who died in 1852. Nearby was discovered another coffin. Decades later, the gardener discovered several more graves.

4. African cladbishte

290 Broadway at Ready Street

This may be hard to believe, but the tax office in the city center is located on an ancient burial ground.

In 1991, builders discovered bones on Broadway from an African-American cemetery located in the same place from the late 1690s to 1794. There were buried and prisoners of war captured by the British during the Revolutionary War. It is estimated that up to 20 thousand people are buried here.

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In 1788, Africans filed a petition so that medical students would stop stealing bodies from a cemetery for research. Almost 200 years later, in 1991, 400 corpses were exhumed and sent to Howard University for study. Today, in addition to the tax office, a monument dedicated to the burial place is located on this site.

5. Park Washingtonsquare

Fifth Avenue at Waverly Place

In this notorious park, many events have occurred. Hipster riots in 1961, the shooting of the film “I Am a Legend,” many arrests of students at New York University, not to mention rock musician David Lee Roth, who was arrested for buying drugs.

Since 1797, this park served as a burial place. Today, about 10 thousand New Yorkers, who died mainly from yellow fever, are resting here.

Prisoners from the nearby Newgate Prison were also buried here, who were executed by hanging from one of the park's trees.

The cemetery was closed in 1825 after complaints from residents of a nearby prosperous area. Soon the land was turned into a park, but the bodies were never removed from it.