Wednesday, February 9, 2011

Gravestone of the Day: John Westcarre

John Westcarre, backdated 1675, Hadley, MA

DOCR IOHN
WESTCARRE DYED
IN SEPR 1675 IN YE
XXXI YEAR OFS AGE

This stone, carved by Joseph Nash, is almost certainly backdated. There are a few Nash stones with dates in the 17teens, but most are from the 1720s and 1730s. It would be very unusual for a carver to go 40 years between carving stones, but not very unusual for a carver to commemorate an important citizen who died before the town had a carver. As I have argued before, Nash probably moved west after the 1690s because he was familiar with Boston stones from that era. Perhaps Dr. Westcarre had a wooden marker that was decaying in the 1720s, or perhaps an elderly widow requested a stone for the husband of her youth when Nash came to town.

1 comment:

Peter Fisk said...

Indeed, according to "Markers," Joseph Nash would have been only about 11 years old in 1675.