Zacheus Barton

Zacheus Barton has a small but impressive stone which has held up well though the years.

He was the fourth of six children.  Sidney Perley tells us that his father, John Barton, was “a physician and an apothecary.  He married Lydia Roberts of Marblehead June 7, 1675; and on a voyage from England the vessel touched at Barbados, where he was called on shore to attend a case of yellow fever.  He took the fever and died there in December, 1694.  His widow subsequently conducted a store; and died May 13, 1713.”   

Zacheus was a tobacco merchant, or at least he tried his hand at being one.  He handed over a cask of tobacco to a Captain Lewis Hunt, having an "agreement to dispose of the same and remit the net proceeds."   He died a month later, on October 14th, 1707.  He was 25 years old, never married, and his cause of death is not known (at least not by me).     

The death’s head is very detailed, with great feathered wings, and the are acanthus leaves filling in the borders.  The rest of the stone is so nicely done that the hourglass(?) at the top sticks out like a sore thumb.  It seems very crudely done, compared to the rest of the workmanship here, and it is barely recognizable as an hourglass; I might not even know what it was supposed to be if I hadn’t seen hourglasses on other stones.  I assume “JG” is the carver, but I do not know who he is.