Friends of Middleborough Cemeteries: The Story In The Stones - Peter Tinkham

The Story In The Stones - Peter Tinkham

By Jeff Stevens/Friends of Middleborough Cemeteries

Posted Sep. 21, 2015 at 11:45 AM 

The oldest burial grounds in Middleborough are a group of old headstones in the back right of Nemasket Hill Cemetery. A small group of small stones cut by the First Middleborough Carver — we do not know his name — sits on the crest of the hill above the Nemasket River. One stone is clearly different from most of the others. It was made by a different carver.

While the First Middleboro Carver decorated his headstones with simple geometric symbols like circles, the unusual stone has a heart shaped face with decorative lines around it. This stone is attributed to the second carver in Middleboro, Seth Tinkham, and the headstone was thought to be the first he ever cut. The stone was made to mark the grave of his father, Peter Tinkham.

Actually, it is almost impossible to see any details on Peter Tinkham’s stone. A thick growth of grayish lichen covers most of the stone. About thirty years ago, a grave rubbing was done that shows much more detail on this unusual stone. The rubbing shows a stylized heart-shaped face with eyes, a nose, and mouth with an arrow-like mark below it. Most headstones created in the first fifty years of the 1700’s had a “death’s head” image that looked like a skull. It appears that Seth wanted a more loving image, not just a reminder of life’s inevitable end. The heart shape was also considered a symbol of life and immortality. Below the image is cut:

HERE LIES THE BODY OF PETER TINKHAM AGED 66 YEARS DECEASED DECEMBER THE 30 1709

Ancestry.com tells us that Peter Tinkham came to Middleboro after King Phillips War. His son Seth was primarily a farmer but also cut a few gravestones and also served as Middleboro Town Clerk because of his unusual reading and writing ability. There are about 50 headstones attributed to Seth Tinkham in our local burial grounds.

Some of Peter Tinkham’s headstone was below the surface of the ground and is very readable, while most of the stone is unreadable. After a light scrubbing with water and a nylon brush, D-2 Biological Solution was sprayed on the lichen. This solution is widely used to remove lichens growing on gravestones and is used in all the national cemeteries. In several weeks the lichens should start falling off, revealing more detail of the original stone. Details of this attempt to return one of our most unusual and historic headstones to readability will follow at a future date.

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