In 2019 I got a message from the W.E.K.A's asking me if I had heard of LíB's OTD series in S. Australia and what OTD stood for?... I had no idea and after some research we had found out that it was a series called On This Day (OTD) with a story for each day of the year. Well that sounded like a crazy fun challenge and so the call went out to the Otago and Southland Geocachers to partake in this series. You'll see in the description that the owners will write in either some muggle, geocaching or personal facts/stories related to this day.
On this day.... 29 October
Dunedin’s first cemetery was a reserve of 15 acres (approximately 6 hectares) in Arthur Street granted by the Crown to the Superintendent of the Provincial Council . Of the original grant, only a small portion in the south eastern corner, bounded by Arthur and Rattray Streets, was used for interment.
The first burial was performed by the Wesleyan minister, Reverend Charles Creed, for a member of Kettle’s surveying team, labourer James Campbell, on 29 October 1846.
It is thought that 80 settlers were buried on the site between 1846 and 1856.2 Perched on the side of a steep hill, the burial ground soon became an eyesore for the fast growing city and was considered inconvenient for burials.
Further, the risks from drainage, particularly after heavy rain, were considered injurious to the health of neighbouring residents (as the spring which feeds Speights Brewery is below).
The Arthur Street cemetery, as it was known, closed on 13 March 1858, but continued to accept burials of family members (‘the corpse or coffin of the husband, wife or parent of any person already buried there’) of those previously interred until at least 1865.
New fencing was erected around a small corner to contain the burial area. No longer an active cemetery, it soon fell into decline and the headstones and fences became dilapidated, despite the efforts of the prisoners who were brought to the site to mend the fences in an effort to keep grazing cattle out. A photograph by Burton Bros dated 1879 (above) confirms the neglect, which prompted Councillor A H Ross to report to Council on 3 June that year that “he believed every councillor was aware of the state of the cemetery and thoroughly ashamed of it.
Council resolved to improve the site, and landscape the area as a memorial park, but not without initial opposition from the families of some of those buried there. Eventually, with the majority support of representatives of the families buried therein, the tombstones and the fences around the graves were removed to other cemeteries and the ground leveled.
The remainder of the land was withheld for public recreation and educational use.
On 4 November 1879 Council adopted the Reserves Committee’s recommendation to commemorate the cemetery site with a single monument near the intersection of Arthur and Rattray Street. George Smith’s preliminary sketch for the memorial shows an obelisk mounted on a stepped platform stone base, surrounded by an iron railing fence.
The families of those buried in the Arthur Street cemetery were offered new burial sites in the Southern Cemetery. For those whose families did not take up the offer their remains were re-interred in a single grave below the memorial.
Made of sandstone, the obelisk was dedicated on 20 August 1880. A tablet on the east face of the obelisk records the event.
For this multi you will need to visit the obelisk and the cache is less than 5mins from this location by foot.
Cache is at S 45° 52.ABC E 170° 29.DEF
Where;
A = The total the number columns of names on all sides of the obelisk.
B = The number of ships shown on the obelisk (don't overthink this one).
C= The number of people with Proudfoot as their surname plus the number of people with Glass as their surname.
D = On the side of the obelisk starting This Monument ... the number of letters in the last word minus one.
E = Quote by Helenslee 18E3.
F = Erected by the Otago Settlers Association 2F March 2001.
Check sum A+B+C+D+E+F = 24
Please remember to bring your own pen, you do need to sign the cache in order to claim the find (as per the guidelines).