Tour of St. Mary’s Cemetery highlights John Butts, young priest, prominent builder

Photos by Tom Rivers

MEDINA – Chris Busch, a trustee of Holy Trinity Parish in Medina, led a tour of the St. Mary’s Cemetery on North Gravel Road last Sunday evening. It is part of the Sunday evening cemetery tours this August, an annual effort led by the Orleans County Historical Association.

Busch believes this was the first official public tour of the cemetery. St. Mary’s started in 1858. There are about 5,000 people buried there. Many of the founders of the Catholic church in medina, which started in 1832, are buried in Lockport because the cemetery wasn’t established in Medina until 1858.

The cemetery is the final resting place for hundreds of Irish immigrants who founded the parish, Busch said. There are numerous Irish surnames throughout the cemetery, he said.

Many of the monuments have the Latin phrase: “Requiescat in Pace,” for “Rest in Peace.”

This marker is for Rev. Richard Harmon, the first resident pastor for St. Mary’s. He was assigned churches from Somerset to Kendall, and travelled by horseback to lead the faithful.

He was tasked with building the church on frontier outside of the village settlements. Harmon died at age 26, less than a year after starting his work in the Medina area.

He is one of nine Catholic priests buried at St. Mary’s.

Sister Bertrand also is noted on this monument. She was a member of the Grey Nuns of the Sacred Heart. She was one of the first nuns to teach in Medina. She died in 1876, at age 25.

Lt. John Butts is buried on the southern end of the cemetery. He is a Medal of Honor recipient who “performed magnificently” while leading soldiers in World War II. Butts was posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor for “courage, unflinching valor and inspiring actions” in Normandy, France on June 23, 1944.

There were about 35 people on the tour. These two women look close at the monument for Patrick O’Grady and his family. He was a prominent sandstone mason and builder who helped lead the construction of the First Baptist Church in Medina, Bent’s Opera House and portions of the original St. Mary’s Church. Three of his children died from tuberculosis within about 6 months of each other.

The large sandstone monument notes the deaths of O’Grady at age 58 on Jan. 4, 1886.

The three children who died in 1885 include Lizzie at age 15 on Feb. 9, Eddie at age 21 on March 31, and John at age 28 on Aug. 21.

I went looking for the grave marker for Marcia Tuohey, who was key leader for Medina and Orleans County. She passed away at age 84 on Aug. 7, 2014. Marcia was well known for her stylist hats.

She was the first woman to serve as Medina’s mayor and then the first woman to serve as chair of the Orleans County Legislature, which she did for eight years.