As appeared in the Gazette Officielle de Quebec 

18 October 1941

No. 42 Vol 73

South Beech Ridge Protestant Union Cemetery Company 

Notice is here by given that under the provision of the Cemetery Companies ' Act ( R.S.Q., 1925 , Chapter 206, as enacted by 19 George V, Chapter 65) letters patent have been issued by the Lieutenant-Governor of the Province of Quebec, bearing date the twenty-second day of September  1941, to incorporate as a corporation without share capital : Miss Lillias E Macfie, Music Teacher, of full age of twenty one years, of theParish of St George de Clarenceville, Dame Melinda Jane Hawley, of the Village of Sweetsbrg, both of the County of Missisquoi, widow of the late Claude B Jameson, in his lifetime, of the same place, Shefiff for the District of Bedfaord, and Arthur C Jameson of Swetsburg aforesaid, Deputy Sheriff for the said district of Bedford, Province of Quebec  for the following purpose. 

Taht there is a small cemetery on the South Beech Ridge, in the Parish of St-Georges de Clarenceville, known  as a public cemetery and bearing  number two hundred and thiry four (234) of the cadastral plan and book reference for the said parish of St George de Clarenceville, already existing and not belonging to any religious institutions or society or to the Church of England or to the Roman Catholics and not already by law incorporated, which has, through lack of control, maintenance and management, fallen in to dilapidated and discreditable condition, and that the petitioners are desirous to be incorporated for the purpose of assuming the control, maintenance and management of the said cemetery and raising of the necessary funds for the said purposes, under the name of the  " South Beech Ridge Protestant Union Cemetery Company"

The head office of the corporation will be in the Parish of Saint  George de Clarenceville in the District of Bedford

The amount to which the value of the immovable property which the corporation may possess is to be limited is one thousand dollars , current money of Canada

Dated at the office of the Attorney General, this twenty second day of September 1941     L Desilets, Deputy Attorny General 

 Please note this company who's FEC number is  15676877 was listed in 1976 12-14 as - en instance de liquidation et dissolution 

There was a mise de jure dated 1993 12 -06 but did not indicate what  it was   so the company most likely is no ( 2014) defunct  

In 1981 , Robert Douglas Macfie and his son Eric rediscovered the old cemetery plot, they were looking for the burial place of Alexander Macfie , the first of their Macfie family to arrive in Canada. Finding Alexander's plot in very bad order, they managed to cut around the space occupied by Alexander and his wife Ann, and her parents. Cleaning just this small lot of grass appeared to them to be somewhat selfish, so they undertook to cut the whole cemetery, to take away the straw and to give the cemetery a decent appearance. This one time effort, continued and these two found themselves, four times a year, traveling from St. Lambert Quebec, to spend Saturday and Sunday mowing the grass at the cemetery.

This lead them to repairing a few of the stones, standing them up right and bracing some of them with metal holders, some they managed to re-cement and other they braced with wood. The up keep becoming an expensive project that at first they could little afford. Douglas and Eric then began to wonder if they was a register showing who was buried there, they hoped to be able to fix more of the stones, and thought if they had a list they could as least double check their work. Alas finding a listing proved a tedious undertaking. Since there was no one church associated with the cemetery, there was not one central location that contained the information. If a list was to be made, any and all records of the area would have to be verified, an enormous task, however some fortune was with them. Attending the Montreal Highland Games, in St. Lambert Que. in 1989, they were stopped at an exhibit when they heard a young man, Albert Smith of Iberville, explaining that he was in possession of much documentation of the area around Clarenceville. Sure enough when asked, he did have a list of the Hawley cemetery residents, a list made by a Mrs. Tremblay in 1957 or there abouts, of the stones that were still standing at that time. It was with pleasure that Douglas and Eric met with Mr. Smith in Iberville to take possession of this most wonderful piece of paper, a listing of the names of the persons who were buried in the Southbeech Ridge Cemetery - the Hawley Cemetery.

With this list in hand, new vigor was instilled in Eric and Douglas, reason to continue to work on the cemetery itself.

Right after this meeting, they came upon the address of Mrs. Beryl Moore, a daughter of Clarence Hawley, she had in her possession a small fund for the cemetery that had been started long ago and was accumulating interest in an attempt to increase the total to a sum that would be worthwhile and allow for some major work to be done.

Eric and Douglas, managed to find parts of the old fence (the original) that had been thrown in the weeds at the back, so they replaced some of the upright poles, repaired others and strung a white plastic chain across the front of the Cemetery. At least people would see that something was happening at that location. The next project was a sign to identify the Cemetery, Eric and Douglas recovered a wooden sign from a store which was closing. With a bit of work and some paint, they were able to create a reasonable identifying sign for the cemetery. One weekend they drove to the cemetery with this 20 foot pole sticking out of the back of the car and they sunk the sign post in to five feet of cement, to which they fixed the sign they had painted.

Now things were looking much better, the grass was being cut on a regular bases, if not regularly, there was a white fence, and sign pole. In October 1997, Eric and Douglas replaced the main gate, they had found the old gate the summer before and had taken it home to repair. Finally the cemetery had become a respectable looking resting spot for many of the long time residents of the area called Caldwell's Manor.

In 1998 Douglas moved from St. Lambert, taking up residence in Perth Ont., he was not not one hour away from Clarenceville, but 4 (four) hours traveling time. He did manage to get one weekend to travel down to cut the grass in 1998, but he had not been able to get back .

Update 1999

....A trip to Clarenceville August 14 1999 has provided us with a delightful surprise. The Cemetery grass had been cut, a ditch had been dug along the roadside, and a culvert with a gravel entrance had been added to the Cemetery . No one we spoke to was able to tell us who undertook this kind work, but we are certainly more than grateful to the benefactors who ever they might be .

Update 2009 .. An e mail received from Miss Vera Schoolcraft states - This benefactor was Raymond Kyling. Raymond is not related to the Hawley or the Maigars but did know the Maigars. He hired men to do a lot of work do to the disarray of the Cemetary. The ditches were dug by the gouvernment but there was no culvert put in to access the Cemetary. This may have been installed by Raymond . -- ( my gracious thanks are extened both to Vera for the information and certainly to Raymond for his efforts )

It has been understood that a local historical society group began the upkeep , however once they found that the cemetery was still being used to bury people they stopped .

List of names taken from standing stones in 1957 or 1958 by Mrs. Georges (Beryl Hauver) Tremblay up dated with list of names that were recorded by Hugh and Malcolm McLellan, May 30th 1941 . ( An attempt will be made to link up the individual names to family web page so that a more complete history may be reviewed, however it must be understood that this will be an on-going project, as not every invidual has had a family member post a web page as of yet)

We must assume that most of the stones were still standing and readable at that time, so the list should be considered as accurate as we are going to have. There are burials after this time which still have to be confirmed and when this is done this list will be updated to that point in time. This list was provided to Doug Macfie, by Mr. Albert Smith, a genealogist , living in Iberville Que.

The deceased are posted in alphabetical order, the wife may be listed twice, once under her married name and again where possible under her maiden name.

Ages are shown in some cases as y- years : m-months : d-days

Due to the age of some of the stones and the deterioration some dates might not be exact , Additions to the original inscriptions in bold Green have been made by Douglas Macfie, as he finds more genealogical notes on the persons buried in this pleasant little cemetery . (his main family lines are done in bold red

As of April , year 2000 , I have obtained a listing of the cemetery stones made by Hugh and Malcolm McLellan, May 30th 1941. Copies of this list can be obtained from the Benjamin F Feinberg Library, Plattsburg State University of New York, 101 Broad St, Plattsburgh NY 12901.2681. There are some of the stones hand drawn by these two gentlemen.

An introduction to their list read

This Cemetery, overgrown and with many broken and fallen stones, is on the west side of the road running into Canada from Alburg Springs VT. It is shown on the Canadian Geological Map as a place named "NUTT". The cemetery has an iron and wire fence along the road. "

On a further page there is a hand written note

" I met Mr Clarence H L ( Henry Lancelot) Hawley May 30 /46, his father was David Frost Hawley and Annie L Rebuen (no stone), grandfather Ashel and Maria Frost, great grandfather Asahel and Mary Gibson, great great grandfather Peter and Hannah Partridge"

"South Beach Ridge Protestant Cemetery - Hawley Cemetery " completed May 30 1946 "

E Edy family

F Flagg family

Hawley

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Macfie

Other cemeteries in the area of the Seiginiory of Foucault, ( Caldwell's Manor ) and the Seiginoty of Noyan ( Christie's Manor) are the

1 st Concession Griggs - Steel
Miranda or 3rd Concession -St Thomas Parish
St Thomas Parish Noyan
Union Cemetery Clarenceville
St George's Anglican
Dairy Valley - Methodist
Brookville
Henryville

Look ups can be done on those familes of these Seignories who have been recorded as buried in one of these cemteries, if you wish to e mail me

[email protected]

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