The Historic City Cemetery

Jacob Summers 1830-1905 Section: GAR Plot      At the age of 16 Jacob enlisted to serve during the Mexican–American War  in Company K of the 2nd New York Volunteer Infantry Regiment . Mexico and the United States both claimed to own Texas. This led to the start of the Mexican American War. For soldiers like Jacob, the war meant long marches, extreme heat, and disease. His regiment saw considerable fighting and at the close of the war Jacob received a medal for his excellent conduct and bravery.       Jacob was just eighteen years old when the war ended, a seasoned veteran before he even had a chance to live. He returned north and married the girl next door, Elizabeth Walters. He establishes the Excelsior  House, which was located in the center the developing the Village Of Tonawanda.  This was an important hub in the community, which hosted events and meetings. The first village elections were even held there.       ...

Stephen Huff Section: A115      In 1813 a series of block houses were erected to help strengthen the Niagara Frontier during the war of 1812. One was on the south shore of Tonawanda Creek near where it meets the river. Stephen and the other local men would have known the ins and outs of the roads and land in this area making them the best Militia. It is likely Stephen Huff spent some time there as his duty would have included guarding the road that connected Buffalo to Fort Niagara. Along this route there were a number of these block houses where the militia men would stop at. He was more than likely in the area when not only the block house in Tonawanda was burned, but also everything from Youngstown to Buffalo.       After the war Stephen became a Justice Of The Peace and was heavily involved in political and social circles. In 1840, Stephen Huff was one of a dozen residents of Tonawanda who stood up for the character of Elisha Parks, who as for help...

Rev Stumpf 1827-1910 G151 The Rev. John Stumpf came to Tonawanda from Germany by way of Canada in 1891. He was the pastor of the German Baptist Church – later named the Broad Street Baptist Church – corner of Broad and Seymour. The Reverend and his wife had a large family of ten children - two of them becoming prolific photographers in the Tonawandas. Many ancestral photos of Tonawanda residents bear the photographer’s name of Stumpf.

Johann 1875-1951 Benjamin                                                                                                 1908-1917                                                                                         G154 and G155      Johann Becker and his family were part of the huge immigration of East Europeans that poured into the United States in the early 20th Century. As was common for immigrating families, Joha...

George Billhover 1917-1978 D62      George Billhover was just one of thousands of German immigrants who found their way to the Tonawandas in the mid 19th Century. He and his wife Elizabeth were raising their five children in North Tonawanda when the Civil War broke out in 1861. In August 1862, his son Louis , age 18, enlisted at Buffalo to serve three years.      In June of 1863, George wrote a letter to his brother back in Germany telling him of how well things were going for him since he came to America. He also told of how proud he was of his son fighting for the Union cause. While George is writing the letter, he receives a letter from his son Louis stating that he felt that the war would be ending soon and then he would be coming home.      Unfortunately, on July 18, 1863, just a couple weeks after writing the letter, son Louis was engaged in the famous battle of Morris Island, South Carolina (at Fort Wagner), a battle featur...

 son is on Erie canal so his funeral was postponed for 7 days got here just in time for funeral frozen for week family was pleased with results homeyer hotel becomes backer hotel  martinsvilles etc first Columbia fire truck names homeyer 

In July of the early 1900s, Tonawanda was dealing with several cases of smallpox — a disease feared not just for its mortality, but for how easily it spread. Homes with infected residents were placed under strict quarantine. No one was supposed to enter or leave. Paul Gorn lived on Wall Street in Tonawanda. His brother, Charles Gorn , was one of those suffering from the disease. That meant Paul Gorn’s home was under quarantine. On a Saturday evening, Paul Gorn ignored it. He left the house, traveled to Kenmore , and made several stops there — potentially exposing countless people to the disease. On his way back, he went even further, stopping at the armory of the 25th Separate Company , where he took a bath. When questioned, Gorn told the officer on duty that he had been vaccinated and was allowed inside. He was then permitted to leave. Once health officials learned what had happened, the response was swift. Health Physician Harris was notified, and Chief of Police Diedrick ann...

Daniel Webster Rundell 1838-1887 Section: GAR Plot      One thing we know for sure about Daniel Rundell is that he was a musician. He played with his brigade band during the Civil War. This was an important job as they were tasked with raising the morale of the men and to use music to pass messages on the battle field.       After the war Daniel came home to his family and became a carpenter. He joined the Scott Post where he played in the GAR band.       In January 1887 members of the Grand Army of the Republic gathered at the Tonawanda  Scott Post headquarters. They gathered for a special meeting to discuss the funeral of Thomas Marling who was to be buried the next morning. Daniel was set to play fife and drum at the service for his late comrade.      However, at some point during the meeting, Rundell began to cough violently and spit blood. The room that had been filled with ordinary conversation turned int...

  This grave marks the resting place of Urial Driggs , one of the oldest and wealthiest early residents of Tonawanda. Urial Driggs died at his home in the village at the age of eighty-one. Until shortly before his death, newspapers noted that he remained active and enterprising — a description rarely given lightly to a man of his age in the 19th century. Driggs was born on November 15, 1802, in Marcellus, Onondaga County, New York. As a boy, he moved west with his father, Roswell Driggs , first to Ontario in Wayne County, and later to the Niagara frontier. His life followed the path of early western expansion. Before the Erie Canal was built, the family moved to Grand Island , and later settled in the village of Tonawanda. Driggs became a successful landowner and businessman, accumulating extensive real estate holdings as the village grew around him. For many years, he was closely connected with the Tonawanda House , an important early hotel and gathering place in the community...

This grave belongs to Franklin Holdridge , a largely ordinary man whose name survives today because of the unsettling legend attached to his daughter, Ella Holdridge — sometimes called Ellie in later retellings. In the late 19th century, Ella Holdridge was known for wandering cemeteries alone. While other children played in streets and schoolyards, Ella preferred places of mourning. She walked the paths of City Cemetery , as well as St. Francis Cemetery and Salem Cemetery , lingering near fresh graves, watching funerals from a distance, memorizing names and dates carved into stone. Newspaper accounts and later retellings describe her as fixated on death — not frightened by it, but comforted by it. She reportedly learned funeral schedules. She knew which bells meant burial. She understood how grief gathered people together. And according to period press stories that later became infamous, that knowledge turned dangerous. Ella’s obsession with cemeteries and funerals allegedly escala...

William cook 1878-1897 Rose Cook 1883-1897 B39         William and Rose Cook were orphans who lived with their aunt in Tonawanda. Just before Christmas in 1897 they were part of a small skating party on Ellicott Creek: two brothers and two sisters enjoying the winter ice. They were skating behind the Rose Ice Company where the ice had been cut leaving it weakened. The ice broke without warning.   William tried to rescue his sister, but was unsuccessful and the pair went under. Michael Coleman managed to hold his sister above the surface long enough for neighbors to hear her screams and pull her to safety. He then slipped beneath the ice and drowned.      William Cook never let go. Witnesses later said that when the bodies were recovered, William and Rose were found locked tightly in each other’s arms , carried together by the current beneath the ice. The newspapers said: "They were so tightly locked in each others arms when found it was ...

One morning, visitors to this cemetery noticed something strange. A man stood alone among the graves, digging into the frozen earth with an old, broken spade. He was not preparing a burial. He had no coffin. No name. No permission. He was looking for a village. The man was Thomas Mullen , an escaped inmate of the Buffalo State Hospital. After slipping away from the institution, Mullen wandered until he reached Tonawanda—where he was found digging here, in this very cemetery, by Patrolman John Kreher. When questioned, Mullen gave an explanation that chilled those who heard it. He said he had come from Lancaster seven years earlier—and that the village had since been submerged . According to Mullen, the only way to find it was to dig. So he did. Using nothing but a damaged spade, he cut into the cemetery soil, searching beneath the dead for a place that existed only in his mind. Hospital attendants later identified him by markings on his clothing. He was known at the asylum only as Pati...

George Kleiber was not a stranger to danger—or to the police. Known throughout Tonawanda as a volatile fisherman, Kleiber lived much of his life in conflict: with the law, with other men on the river, and eventually with his own family. His name appeared repeatedly in newspapers under grim headlines— attempted murder , illegal fishing , violent assault . One summer night, inside the bottling department of the Tonawanda Brewing Company, an argument erupted between Kleiber and another fisherman, George Walrath. Each accused the other of illegal fishing on the Niagara River—specifically the use of dynamite, a destructive and outlawed method. Words quickly turned to threats. Witnesses later said Kleiber became enraged, shouting that he would kill Walrath “if it took all night.” When others tried to remove him from the building, Kleiber drew a revolver from his hip pocket, leveled it, and pulled the trigger. Only the quick action of a bystander saved Walrath’s life—the bullet struck the bui...

     The Niagara River was not just a boundary it was an opportunity. In 1865, as the Civil War had just ended and enforcement struggled to reassert control, smuggling flourished along the water between Canada and Western New York. Whiskey, goods, and contraband crossed quietly at night, often landing on Grand Island before being hauled into the city.      One of the names that surfaced repeatedly in court records was Elijah V. Day . According to newspaper accounts, Day was arraigned before Justice Albro on charges far more serious than smuggling alone. He stood accused of feloniously assaulting and shooting Emanuel Hensler , a deputy customs officer. The shooting allegedly occurred on Grand Island on July 10, 1865.      Day waived examination and was committed for trial. At the same time, federal authorities pursued him for a related offense: resisting a deputy collector in the discharge of his duties during a smuggling operation. Earlier ...

     The Kleiber brothers were well known in Tonawanda—but not for anything honorable. George and Henry Kleiber spent much of their lives tangled in violence, drunkenness, arrests, and the dangerous world of illegal river fishing along the Niagara. Newspaper reporters followed them for years, documenting court appearances, drunken assaults, fishing raids, and moments where lives nearly ended in bloodshed. The river gave them work. It also helped destroy them. Both brothers made their living as fishermen, but authorities repeatedly accused them of “pirating” the river with illegal seines and destructive fishing methods. During one raid near the mouth of Rattlesnake Creek, game protectors seized over 500 pounds of illegally caught carp connected to Henry Kleiber. Officers confiscated the skiff and marched the fishermen to the station while crowds watched the haul disappear into police custody. But it was violence—not fishing—that made the Kleiber name feared. George Kleiber...

       George Lebherz did not die in battle, nor from illness, nor in old age.      He died doing the quiet, dangerous work that kept a growing city clean.      On an afternoon in 1911, George was working high above Main Street, removing awnings from the windows of the Chamber of Commerce building. He was 41 years old, a skilled window cleaner who had done this work for more than a decade. His safety depended on a leather harness and a pair of ropes—standard equipment at the time, and utterly unforgiving of error.      As George passed an awning through a fifth-floor window to his coworker, one rope suddenly failed. Witnesses below saw his body fall backward into open air, turning end over end as it struck the building’s stone cornice before crashing to the sidewalk. Hundreds of people were on the street that day. Many saw him fall. None could help.      When authorities reached him, his injuries were catas...

In the early morning hours of March 25 , 1910 Edward was working as a night watchman , stationed in a small shanty on Payne Avenue , guarding a home quarantined for smallpox . At the time, contagious disease was feared deeply, and watchmen like Flatow stood long, lonely shifts to protect the public. Edward was a one-legged man , relying on an artificial limb , which he had removed while resting inside the shanty. Just after 5 a.m. , an oil stove exploded , instantly filling the small structure with fire. Trapped inside, Edward threw a carpet over the stove and managed to hurl the burning heater out of the building, suffering severe burns to his face and arms. His hair and eyebrows were scorched away as flames surged higher. Before he could reach his artificial leg, fire blocked the doorway completely. He used a hammer , knocked down part of the wall, and crawled out through the opening. He collapsed nearby from exhaustion and injury. Neighbors, responding to his cries, found him barely...

     Here is buried Marvin Craig , a ten-year-old boy whose life and death deeply affected the Tonawanda community.      Marvin was the son of James Craig , a blind peddler who lived on Adams Street . Despite his young age, Marvin played an essential role in his family’s life. Newspapers described him as bright, dependable, and well known to local businessmen , whom he encountered daily while guiding his father through town so he could earn a living. For the Craig family, Marvin was not only a child, but a helper and protector.      On a July afternoon, Marvin accompanied his father to fish from the Lefalver & Company lumber docks at Gratwick along the Niagara River . While moving along the edge of the dock, the boy fell into the water. Unable to swim, he was quickly swept away.      James  Craig heard the splash and desperately tried to reach his son, but disoriented among the stacked lumber and unable to see, he cou...

I n the winter of 1885 , disturbing truths surfaced about Tonawanda’s South Side cemetery—truths that suggested the dead here were not resting peacefully . Newspapers reported that the cemetery had fallen into chaos and neglect . Burial records were so poorly kept that lot boundaries vanished , numbers were altered, and families unknowingly buried their loved ones on top of strangers . Some plots were packed so tightly with bodies that no one could say with certainty who lay where. Worse still were allegations that corpses were secretly exhumed —removed under cover of darkness and relocated to the pauper’s field to make room for new burials. Families were not notified. The dead were moved without ceremony, their identities lost to careless recordkeeping. One incident haunted readers most. During the funeral of a well-known Tonawandian, the grave digger uncovered another body already in the grave . With the funeral procession moments away, there was no time to explain. The exposed c...

Fred Yerke was 26 years old and lived with his parents on Erie Street . Like many young men of his generation, he struggled to find steady work during a period of economic uncertainty. He had a close friend named  John Schrier.  A local newspaper described them as “life-long chums.” On January 31 , the two young men bought two ounces of carbolic acid at the store of R A Jenke on Main and Niagara. Later they went to Edwin Langbehn's saloon at 260  Main Street . They ordered two beers, shook hands, and drank the poison laced beer. They died within minutes of one another.  Newspapers of the time reported that their deaths appeared to have been planned together , though the exact reasons were never fully understood. Authorities noted that both men were unemployed, and speculation ranged from despair over their circumstances to youthful bravado. No clear explanation was ever found.