Nathaniel Richardson

Nathaniel Richardson was a leather tanner who, at the time of his tragic death on January 25, 1794, ran the most successful tannery in the county, located just off the Common.  His simple headstone informs us that "His death was instant, from the pressure of a building he was assisting to remove.  He was an industrious man in the full prosperity of Life."  He was only 54.  His stone has an unusual border (in her great book "Our Silent Neighbors," Betty Bouchard describes it as "resembling the crimping of a pie crust," and it certainly does) that I have not seen elsewhere. 

Although not seen too often today, moving a building was a fairly common practice in the old days.  He and others were moving a house down Daniels Street, toward the water, when it slipped, falling on Nathaniel and killing him instantly.     

Fate had not been kind to the rest of the Richardson family, either; Nathaniel and his wife, Eunice (nee Putnam, 1751-1846), had a daughter, Betsey, who died just a few weeks short of her first birthday (though their five other children would live into adulthood).  Betsey is buried right next to her father: 

Betsey's stone is inscribed at the very bottom:

Sleep on, my babe, & take thy rest
God called thee home, & tho' it best.

And then Nathaniel's brother, Joshua, killed himself in 1774 at the age of 28.  He is also nearby.

The bottom of Nathaniel's the stone reads, "Ux Et Fil Vi Pos."  I don't speak Latin, but fiends of mine do, and they tell me that the phrasing is kind of odd, but it looks like it translates as "Placed by wife and six children," evidently including Betsey.  Which is sweet, in a Wordsworth's "We Are Seven" kind of way.