|
Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...
|
The only newspaper in San Mateo County, the Times-Gazette ran a piece in January 1859 about 13 burials taking place on the property of William Cary Jones. Jones’s property happened to be where today’s Sequoia High School is located.
The subsequent property owner, Horace Hawes, didn’t like having graves on his estate. He made a request to have the bodies exhumed and relocated. This threw all of Redwood City into a tizzy. City officials held a meeting at the courthouse to discuss the issue. Those charged with the decision agreed that Mr. Hawes' request was valid. Thus, a committee was established to find a suitable location for the bodies. Committee members included John Vinton Diller, James W. Turner and Charles N. Fox.
They decided on a piece of land well outside downtown Redwood City, along the route to Woodside. An agreement was struck with the landowners, and the deal was done.
What also came as a result of a courthouse meeting was the establishment of the Union Cemetery Association on Feb. 28, 1859.
Two items of note:
– It became the first American burial ground in San Mateo County
– It’s the only Union Cemetery in the Bay Area
Since California was a member of the Union during the Civil War, the Times-Gazette caused an uproar when it ran an article on Memorial Day 1885 indicating no members of the Grand Army of the Republic were buried in the cemetery.
One year later a formal plot for the GAR was established. Many Army members were subsequently buried there.
A life-sized soldier’s statue was erected in 1889. It was vandalized and replaced more than once. After multiple attacks over the decades, in 1999 a new more durable version was erected. Pieces of the original statue are housed at the San Mateo County History Museum.
The cemetery has been closed since 1918.
In 1983, it was added to the National Register of Historic Places.
Everything else is just history
Some of the photos used in this blog are courtesy of the Local History Room, Redwood City's best-kept secret. The Local History Collection covers all aspects of Redwood City's development, from the 1850s to the present day, with particular emphasis on businesses, public schools, civic organizations, city agencies, and early family histories. The Local History Room is not affiliated with the Redwood City Public Library, but it is inside it.
