Potters Field monument to be unveiled in Ingersoll

Ingersoll Rural Cemetery Board holds dedication event for unmarked graves of slaves, the poor and others at a rural cemetery, reports CTV London's Gerry Dewan.

A monument will be unveiled Saturday at a rural cemetery near Ingersoll revealing the names of hundreds of people buried in unmarked graves.

Amidst the rows of headstones in the Ingersoll Rural Cemetery sits an empty space about the size of a football field.

The lack of headstones belies the fact that hundreds are buried at the location -- their stories untold.

Western University History and Indigenous Studies professor Cody Groat wanted to change that.

“I was able to hire some research students who over the past three years have been looking through burial registries, census records to find everyone’s names who are listed here, but also to learn about their stories.”

The Ingersoll Rural Cemetery was established in 1864 and from its earliest days there’s been a plot of land in the very back corner where people were buried.

They were often interred without headstones because of race, poverty or other social issues.

Potter’s Field is a common term for the location in a cemetery where unknown individuals are placed.

Now a monument will be revealed at the edge of the Potter’s Field in the Ingersoll Rural Cemetery.

It will be unveiled during a ceremony at 2 p.m. on Saturday. The monument will list almost all the names of those resting at the location. A handful that couldn’t be identified will still be acknowledged.

Debbie Johnston is chair of the Ingersoll Rural Cemetery Board and worked closely with Groat and his team

“Being able to tell when they came where they came from, what they were doing when they were here. People from the (United) States who had been former slaves, people from China.”

There are a few small stones scattered about the Potter’s Field, almost all added after burial. One of those stones is about 15 centimetres high and 40 centimetres long. Groat said it was placed at that site by a proprietor of Ingersoll’s first Chinese laundry, who wanted to pay tribute to the man who supported him

“A man named Wong Wing Quan, who was impacted by the Chinese head tax. And if you look at this stone in a certain light, you can see Mandarin Chinese vertically.”

Groat says members of a Chicago family will attend the ceremony on Saturday, paying tribute to relatives who travelled to Ingersoll to escape slavery.

Johnston told CTV News that for years people would pass over the Potter’s Field, many not knowing people buried there.

She only found out from her grandmother after they came to lay flowers at the grave of her grandfather.

“She explained it later. She said people who couldn’t afford to buy a grave were buried here. So, it was known, but the extent and the size was not known.”

Groat said, in an era where we continue to grapple with issues related to unhoused people, he hopes the monument will be a reminder that people shouldn’t just be forgotten.

“Hopefully this monument isn’t just a one day unveiling. It’s a chance for people to come learn and also really humanize the individuals buried here and recognize that some of the patterns reflected in the potter’s field still exist today. So, it’s a lesson not just about the past, but about the future as well.”

Zorra Township and the Town of Ingersoll shared the $20,000 cost of the monument.