When I went to the Brooklin Cemetery on Wednesday, I came across this mostly unreadable little marker for a son named “Jacob E.” It was among much larger monuments and near one for “Jacob S. Freethey” in what appeared to be a Freethey family plot area. (That family was among the original settlers here.)
The stone was under a Japanese maple that was creating a scarlet frenzy in this sacred place, wildly flinging her vibrant leaves. Perhaps it was my mood, but I found the sight to be soberly stunning: a very small, gray gravestone – was Jacob a dead child? – in a red rain that covered the burial area with flaming puddles.
(Images taken in Brooklin, Maine, on November 6 and 8, 2024.)
November 10, 2024, postscript: According to a gravesite registry found by Lorna Rockwell Grant, Jacob died young (“d.y.’); he was the son of Captain Ellis Edwin Freethey (1834-1910) and Hattie R. Herrick ((1842-1907. They were married on May 24, 1864 in Boston. Captain Freethey may have served in the Civil War.